


Breaking the Cycle

by spiderboyneedsahug



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Co-Parenting, Coma, Heavy Angst, Helen Cho is a BAMF, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, Hurt Peter Parker, Injury Recovery, Introspection, James "Rhodey" Rhodes & Tony Stark Friendship, James "Rhodey" Rhodes is a Good Bro, Jesus Fuck This WIP Got Out Of Control, Major Character Injury, May Parker Needs a Hug, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Precious Peter Parker, Serious Injuries, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, Tony Stark Feels, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Has Daddy Issues, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Tony Stark Panics a Lot, What Have I Done, Whump, Worried May Parker (Spider-Man), no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-27
Updated: 2019-01-29
Packaged: 2019-09-01 09:30:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 49,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16762471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spiderboyneedsahug/pseuds/spiderboyneedsahug
Summary: You'd think, being a billionaire, playboy, philanthropist, ex-CEO and now Avenger, Tony Stark would be used to just about anything that got thrown his way. 2012 was rough, but he survived. Ultron was a disaster from start to finish, but he's still alive. Sure, the Accords and Germany- that was a disaster, unprecedented and horrible, but he survived.And now he's mentoring the damn Spider-kid. He seemed nice, little meek, overall a good kid. Did good on the field. How hard could it be to nudge him in the right direction? Enter a bewinged, Chitauri-tech selling weapons dealer, and Tony gets his answer.Very.Oh,Tony thinks,I might be in over my head.Ahead of him, the ferry continues to split in half.





	1. The Incident, Part 1

**Author's Note:**

> Riiiiiiiiiiiiiight, so! 
> 
> Originally, I wasn't going to post this until I had the whole story written out, but 1. I lie to myself, 2. I need reviews for inspiration and 3. I hit 10K followers on Tumblr today!! So this is kind of a thanks, kind of a 'help me' sorta thing.
> 
> So, without further ado:  
> the fucking homecoming fic (as labelled in my drafts djsdck)
> 
> And!!!! Because I forgot!!! Thanks to Tumblr's very own @fukmeintheassandcallmecastiel and @welove1stickyboi for reviewing, editing, and putting up with this monster of a document!!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Him, him, him. Always him, no matter who’s asking, which means it can’t be the speaker’s kid because statistically, the chance that every single person begging Tony to ‘help him’ is asking Tony to help their son is pretty low. Not to mention that the people asking Tony’s help are keeping their kids, if they have them, close to their bodies. Maybe someone got knocked out by falling debris? For an instant, he wonders if someone may have slipped through the gap of the split ship — no. The bots wouldn’t have let that happen. Tony scowls. He’ll have to let Peter know that his little stunt got someone hurt, maybe even worse. No — don’t think like that. Not yet. He can’t let himself fall down that rabbit hole. He’s on a mission, and right now, his mission is to find Peter, and whoever the hell got hurt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's a me, it's a FUCK

There are many things on his mind when the news story first breaks. Work, the accords, how Pepper’s day has been, et cetera. Then the TV goes loud, and his attention fully zeroes in on the report.

Tony’s eyes widen, and he slams his pen down onto the desk next to the now-abandoned paperwork, suddenly enraptured within the arriving bulletin. He watches with an increasing sense of foreboding as the the words slowly drag across the bottom of the TV screen, screaming out to the world in bold, capitalised letters that Spider-Man is fighting an unknown villain — probably that flying Vulture guy — on a ferry. The billionaire’s reaction is immediate and profound, as most things are with him (according to Pepper), but the one thing that really stands out among the medley of curses and other things that no child should hear is _I’m gonna kill that kid._

He _told_ Peter to stay away, he _told_ Peter to stick to what he was doing. And what did the kid do? The one goddamn thing he _explicitly_ said not to do. That’s why Tony tries to stay away from kids — Harley was different, Harley wasn’t a goddamned super-idiot — because they _don’t_ listen, and are _apparently_ a burden equal to that of a ferry that is splitting in half. Is he meant to be this stressed out? No. Is he anyways? _Yes._

It’s kind of hypocritical, his judgement, given how _he_ used to be the loose canon, but… Peter’s a kid. He was decidedly _not._ It kinda matters if Peter gets himself killed.

Immediately after the news announcement drags itself off the screen (as slowly as it arrived, clock ticking mockingly in his ears), Tony’s in his armour, two whole squadrons of his tiny thruster drones on his six. The entire flight towards the ferry is marked by a continuous, painful stream of curses from the billionaire playboy, all calling out a certain teenager’s inability to listen to goddamn orders.

If Tony was in his right mind, he’d remind himself that Peter isn’t some soldier, like Rogers, but a teenager. A _kid._ Nobody ever said teenagers were known for their ability to listen. Only, Tony’s not in his right mind. His arms are shaky with rage and his body temperature _has_ to be way too elevated to be normal. He’s never known anger like this before, and that’s not good for a mission, no matter how small.

And then he sees the ferry, splitting apart in a way that seems almost comical, and he knows that ‘small’ is not the word that describes this situation. In a brief moment of passing insanity, his mind flashes to the Titanic, but no — the ocean liner in the Oscar-winning movie went down nose up, and more importantly, this isn’t a DiCaprio movie, this is _real life,_ with Peter somewhere on that splitting ship. Oddly enough, though, when he sees the chaos, the only thing he feels is annoyance-tinged anger. No concern at all, just… _anger._ Different than the kind he feels after sitting in a pointless board meeting for two hours, different than the irritation he feels when a design flaw reveals itself and he has to start over — different from what he feels every time he looks at Steve Rogers, even. This is worse. The sharp, boiling sensation inside only grows hotter when he hears shaky yells and cries from Peter as he tries to hold the two halves of the boat together by _himself,_ slowly descending on his webs as Tony’s thruster bots separate and push the ferry back together again. If Peter could just use that goddamn brain of his for once in his life, he would have known that he was out of his league and then _this_ wouldn’t be happening. Tony shouldn't be cleaning up the kid’s messes for him — Peter’s smart, smart enough to do that himself. If he wasn’t, Tony wouldn’t have given him the suit in the first place.

But then again, _this_ is happening. Maybe he overestimated the kid.

If it weren’t for the civilian casualties it would cause, Tony has half a mind to just let Peter deal with the fallout by himself. But there _are_ civilians, and now he can’t see the red-and-blue of Peter’s suit amongst the chaos, so he has to fix the damage before anyone else gets hurt. And, on top of that, he has to find the headache of a hero now, too.

The screams have only just started to quiet — for better or for worse — when Tony is done welding the metal of the boat back together from the outside. He has drones sealing the other floors on the inside, so… crisis _barely_ averted.

His eyes narrow. Now he just has to find Peter. He can think of a punishment along the way. For a fuck up this colossal, he’ll definitely have to take away the suit. At least. Before the kid gets any more cocky and has to bear the brunt of guilt that stems from getting someone killed.

“FRIDAY, find him.” _God,_ he hates how this makes him sound so much like Howard. Well, it scares him that he’s comparing his position in Peter’s life to Howard in his. It’s only been a few days since Germany, what right does he have to be anything more than a mentor (and apparently, not a good one at that). But becoming the next Howard, turning into his own father, is the only thing he’s made an actual, considerable effort to avoid for his entire life, and he’s failing, even now. All the same, though — Peter has to learn. He made a mistake, he fucked up _big_ time. He can’t run from that. Trust Tony, he’s tried. It never solves anything.

 _‘Spider-Man’s tracker is currently offline, boss.’_ In response, Tony doesn’t even bother to muffle his curse. He finds himself wondering if FRIDAY could keep track of every time Tony swears in a day. If he could have a dollar for every one, well… it’s not like he needs the money, but all the same. It could be a good publicity thing. Anyway — not only does the kid think it’s okay to go against strict orders to _not engage the supervillain_ , but apparently, he decided to hack into a multimillion dollar suit? To remove the tracker, the one thing that had saved his life when he first engaged the Vulture? Once again, Tony finds himself regretting taking the smart kid under his wing, just a bit.

Of course, Tony’s pissed, but at the same time, he can’t help but give the kid a bit of credit — he’s got ingenuity, he’ll give him that much. Regardless, that doesn’t cancel the fact that Tony no longer knows what to do. The anger in his veins is too hot for him to even think about his next actions. Is this how Howard felt, on the few occasions he bothered to give enough of a shit about Tony to yell at him for a fuck up?

“Looks like we’re doing this manually, then. Anyone seen him leave the ferry?” He says, hovering steady in the air; more steady than his heart in his chest, certainly.

_‘The security feeds on the thruster drones at the exit routes have nothing, boss. He’s still here.’_

Tony grits his teeth. Most of the ferry’s windows are broken, so getting inside is no problem. Finding Peter, however… especially if the kid doesn’t want to be found — he’s not stupid-

Okay, that’s debatable, but all the same, he must know he’s getting the rag for this. After growing up with Howard and his anger, Tony can understand where the kid’s coming from. Then again, that would imply that he thinks about Tony the same way Tony did about his own dad — he can’t be that bad… can he?

Suddenly repulsed, Tony shakes his head in an attempt to clear it.

Tony’s thoughts are muddled a bit by hushed gasps and mutters coming from the people who are looking at him, awe still easily discernible on their expressions. He would have thought that, after just shy of a decade of him gallivanting around in a metal suit, they’d be used to it, but… apparently not. The Tin Can Man with a Plan is still a _big deal,_ it seems. He’s not sure how to feel about that. But right now, there’s also terror, concern and lingering remnants of panic. All completely understandable emotions, especially given the situation. Which makes bringing Peter to see what he caused all the more necessary.

“Have any of you seen Spider-Man?” Heads snap around to look at him when he asks, and the crowd quickly parts, Red Sea style. The amount of people blocking his path increases as he walks through the crowds, making it harder to avoid bumping shoulders with people who are already stressed enough as it is.

For a few seconds, it’s quiet as he walks. Then those seconds pass, and people are bouncing questions off him faster and louder than he can answer, their words ricocheting off the metal of the suit like bullets. It’s chaotic and painful, the wide range of voices becoming a little too much to effectively listen to, an overwhelming raucous mess of jumbled words. His eyebrows draw inwards, the already present sensation of stress climbing up into his throat.

He takes the time to listen to all the things people are shouting to him. It’s difficult to decipher any words from the cacophony of noise.

“-You have to help him-”

“-He’s hurt real bad-”

“-I don’t know what’s wrong with him, he just _isn’t_ waking up-”

“-We’re lucky there was a paramedic here, we’ve done what we can for him but we’re limited to what we could do-”

“-We put a blanket on him, you’re supposed to do that when people are hurt, right-?”

Him, him, _him._ Always _him,_ no matter who’s asking, which means it can’t be the speaker’s kid because statistically, the chance that every single person begging Tony to _‘help him’_ is asking Tony to help their son is pretty low. Not to mention that the people asking Tony’s help are keeping their kids, if they have them, close to their bodies. Maybe someone got knocked out by falling debris? For an instant, he wonders if someone may have slipped through the gap of the split ship — no. The bots wouldn’t have let that happen. Tony scowls. He’ll have to let Peter know that his little stunt got someone hurt, maybe even worse. No — don’t think like that. Not yet. He can’t let himself fall down that rabbit hole. He’s on a mission, and right now, his mission is to find Peter, and whoever the hell got hurt.

He pushes forward. Right now, the mysterious _him_ that everyone wants him to save is more important than Peter.

The rest of the crowd parts way, leaving someone’s limp form exposed in plain sight. They’re lying on their side, arms protectively curled around their centre as if they’ve bruised their ribs or worse, and there’s a blanket hiding most of their body from sight, so Tony can’t see if there’s any blood. The person isn’t moving at all; breaths difficult to distinguish, they’re so slight. There’s no telling at all if they’re conscious. Tony’s prepared to take a chance and say that no, they’re _not._ People are gently shaking their arms and shoulders in attempts to coax the kid — too small to be an adult — back into wakefulness, but none of them are working. He remains dead to the world.

Hot anger turns to cold dread in Tony’s veins so quickly that his head swims as he looks at the red and blue Spider-Man suit, panic starting to grow in his gut at the unmoving kid trapped within it.

_Peter._

Oh god.

Tony’s steps are swift as he moves towards Peter’s collapsed form, the heavy metal boots clanking against the platform with his brisk, mission-driven movement. The blanket that the civilians have put on him covers the majority of his body excluding the mask, but it’s enough to know that it’s Peter, and that he’s hurt. The occasional twitching shiver still runs through his body. Upon closer examination of the suit, he can see where the water spray hit Peter.

“FRIDAY, activate the Spider-Man suit’s heaters.” His voice is quiet, hushed, but authoritative all the same, and the crowd watches him with anticipation — the billionaire commands their attention without trying. Tony’s been described by people as ‘imposing’, ‘intimidating’, and ‘bossy’. He likes to think of it as ‘commanding’ and ‘magnetizing’. The only sign that anything has even remotely changed from the shaking is the slight relaxation of Peter’s posture — that could be a good thing or a bad thing, and judging from the situation, Tony’s betting on the latter. Peter doesn’t wake up, confirming Stark’s suspicions, and the crowd does what crowds do best — talk. Everyone starts to fire off concerned questions again, all at once, and for a moment Tony is reminded of the seagulls from _Finding Nemo._

“What am I looking at here? And no medical jargon. Dumb it down. I want everything.” He asks FRIDAY, tuning out the audience he’s gained as best he can. There’s a quiet whirring as FRIDAY scans Peter’s unconscious body, and Tony uses this moment to calm himself down as best he can, clear his head. Said feat is easier said than done, though, because the amount of time she spends scanning is the first sign that the damage is _very_ bad, and does nothing to ease Tony’s heightening anxiety. After a moment too long, FRIDAY delivers the bad news.

_‘Holding the ferry together has caused damages to nearly every muscle group in the subject’s body. Most severe tearing suffered to the deltoid muscles, both pectoralis major and pectoralis minor muscles, the biceps, latissimus dorsi and the rotator cuff muscles. There is severe muscle strain in the subject’s abdominals as well as minor straining to leg muscles. Cracking of ribs suggests a close combat situation that occured prior to these damages.’_

Okay, now Tony’s starting to feel terrible about how angry he was earlier. He could have found the kid just to yell at him, only for the damages to get to Peter and kill him. He’s no Helen Cho, he’ll readily admit that, and that big jumble of medical terminology sets him off kilter a bit — he works with machines, not with people — but it’s enough to know that Peter is not okay.

“Jesus Christ. Anything else?” He asks, and tries to keep his voice steady.

He fails at _that,_ too.

_‘Spiking fever, rapid pulse and unconsciousness are all signs of internal hemorrhaging. Given the strain the subject’s body was under, this is a critical situation. Immediate medical attention is advised.’_

_Crap,_ crap. It’d almost be comical, how calm and collected FRIDAY’s tone is as she delivers such horrible news. If it wasn’t so dire a situation, and it wasn’t about Peter, Tony might have laughed. He sometimes wonders about that, what it would be like to be a machine. Everything systematic, practical, without having to worry about emotions getting in the way.

It wouldn’t be the same. He wouldn’t like a life like that, even if shit like _this_ is what he gets.

“I have to take him. Whose blanket is this?” He rolls Peter onto his back, ignoring the small, choked whine that comes after as best he can. Peter’s limbs don’t move at all, as his torso is moved, awkwardly contorted in a way that can’t be comfortable. Muscular damage, _right._ Those limbs aren’t going to be moving unassisted for a _long_ time.

A small voice in the back of Tony’s mind says that Peter will be lucky if he moves those limbs at all.

He promptly ignores it.

A woman steps forward, a small child clinging to her leg. She gestures at the blanket, then to Spider-Man.

“It’s ours, but he can keep it. He needs it more.” She looks concerned for the kid, even despite the mask. It would be heartwarming, if it weren’t for the fact that Peter is gravely injured, and Tony doesn’t have time for sentiment right now. There are still people — strangers, sat next to Peter’s unconscious body. A quick once-over tells Tony that they have been gently manipulating Peter’s arms and legs so they would rest comfortably against his body. Tony notices this, and is infinitely grateful for the- well, this random group’s support. It’s a reminder that all the good things Peter does for New York come back to him at some point, even if they’re very small acts of help. Even if they haven’t wound up killing him in the end. He’ll have to tell Peter about this when he wakes up.

_If_ he wakes up.

He will wake up.

(He has to.)

“Thank you.” He makes sure to tuck the blanket under Peter when he picks the kid up. His legs and arms dangle uselessly, uncontrolled like a puppet with cut strings, to the point where Tony has to tuck Peter’s arms into the makeshift blanket burrito just to stop them from moving around.

_Muscle tears. Loss of control in limbs._

Yeah, this is… bad. And yes, Tony’s a genius, if you can’t tell. _Tony_ certainly can’t, not right now. But he doesn’t have to be a genius to know that Peter’s uncanny likeness to a rag doll can’t be a good thing.

“Will he be okay?” A solitary voice calls to him. The question is echoed by nearly everyone, and despite the different tones and accents, there’s a sense of unity within their concern for Spidey, and it warms Tony’s heart within the arc reactor that protects it.

“I’ll do everything I can to keep him alive.” He’s never meant anything more. This seems to placate the crowd, as they start to move again, milling around without purpose as victims of disaster so often do, and Tony starts the journey to the compound — anything else that needs picking up, the bots can handle. Right now, Parker’s his number one priority.

He looks down and immediately regrets it.

He hates how small Peter looks in his arms. The suit is a saving grace because it stops him from seeing Peter’s expression, but the unnatural thinness of the kid’s frame forces him to remember that Peter is just a _child._ Sure, a child who is in way over his head and tackled something that he knew he wouldn’t be able to take without damages, but still a child.

He hasn’t known Peter for a long time at all. Hell, he basically only met the kid a few days back and has hardly seen anything of him since, aside from media presence. Still, he can’t help but feel more connected to the kid than he has to most other people he knows already, as if Peter is someone he’s known for much longer than he actually has. Maybe it’s because Peter is obviously as desperate for a father figure as Tony was with Howard. Maybe it’s because Tony sees a mirror reflection of his younger self in Peter. But the damn kid has already wormed in pretty close to Tony’s heart, slipping right through the reactor.

Maybe that’s why it hurts so much to see Peter so… beaten. Broken. Peter has the same untamed stubbornness and personality that he has and the similarities don’t end there, either. It just _hurts_ to see the kid so small, and for a moment, he wonders if maybe he could take Peter’s webbing and bind the kid like a mummy, but who knows how long that might take, and the compression may make the internal bleeding or whatever worse, and God, Tony doesn’t know the first thing about medical _anything-_

His panicked musings are drawn back to reality as he hears Peter struggling to draw in each breath, the noise an unsteady, gurgling sound that chokes Tony’s ears and pounds inside his head on repeat. Tony’s eyes widen — he thought he’d have more time before anything got worse. Panic forces him to flounder aimlessly for a few seconds before he tugs the mask from Peter’s face in an attempt to better expose the kid to the air he is obviously struggling to draw in.

And that’s his first mistake.

Peter’s face is pale, drawn with pain and covered by a thin sheen of sweat. Tony’s heart does a weird stunt in his chest when he looks at his expression, because the kid looks like he’s dead already. There’s no sign of breathing at all; the only reason he knows Peter _is_ still breathing is because FRIDAY hasn’t said otherwise, and Tony’s really, really hoping she won’t. It’s with a flare of dread that he takes in how Peter’s lips are turning blue, how deathly his skin tone is.

He looks like a corpse.

He clutches Peter closer and pushes the suit to go faster, praying that the altitude isn’t making Peter’s condition worse. “FRIDAY, update.”

_‘Internal bleeding is progressing and likely to develop into hypovolemic shock within the next half an hour. Medical care is urgently required. Would you like me to contact Dr. Cho?’_

“Yeah, do that. Show her all his symptoms.”

_‘Will do. Your breathing is becoming irregular. Would you like me to run through some breathing exercises?’_

“Nah, I’ll… I’ll be fine.”

 _‘If you say so.’_ A small, hysterical laugh bubbles up in his chest at that, escapes his lips without Tony’s consent. FRIDAY is no JARVIS, but she _does_ have a sense of humour on her, and right now, Tony’s grateful for it. Peter remains unconscious as Tony carves through the skies, skin tone gradually fading. He’s horribly aware of each second as it passes by.

It catches him by surprise when Peter breaks into a wet sounding coughing fit. He’s obviously still unconscious, eyes shut and paling rapidly, but Peter still jerks convulsively as he tries and fails to clear his lungs.

It’s worse when bright red starts mixing in with spittle, staining the material of the blanket he’s wrapped up in with blood.

“Hey hey hey! Come on, Parker…” _Shit,_ shit shit shit. He goes cold with shock as the rattling coughs get worse, panic making his arms shaky when they can’t afford to be. He can’t shift the kid upright to help him clear his lungs, either, because they’re flying horizontally for higher speed and for the kid to be able to cough properly he has to be vertical. He has to watch as Peter trembles and coughs hoarsely with a growing panic attack clawing at his gut; it’s no longer fine red spots escaping Peter as he chokes but small _streams_ of crimson, more blood spilling from his mouth down his chin.

It’s when Peter’s breaths turn to rasping that he can’t stand doing nothing anymore. He can’t watch Peter choke to death on his own blood like this. He doesn’t want to slow down on the flight, but Peter will definitely suffocate before they get to the compound at this rate and moving Peter’s body upright so he can clear his lungs is impossible travelling at high speeds, so he lets the suit decelerate. Tony has Peter upright at the same time the suit is completely stationary in the air, hovering in the quiet as he makes sure the kid’s head rests on his shoulder. Tony wishes, just for a second, that Peter was awake to wrap his arms around him. The red-clad arms don’t move though.

_That isn’t a hug, I’m just getting the door for you. We’re not there yet._

He’s not sure if it’s a hug now. It might as well be for how hard he’s clutching the kid in his arms, as if holding him will stop him from slipping away forever. The slightness of Peter’s frame under his hands is a cold, harsh reminder of how _young_ he is, too young to be suffering like this. He’s not sure if bringing Peter in to fight in Germany was the best idea now. Not when it’s wound up like this.

He hates how he has to support Peter’s head as the kid chokes out blood over his shoulder. The following coughs sound less shallow and more productive, and it forces a morbid sense of relief to sit alongside his nausea. When the fit finally comes to an end, there’s a spattering of blood across Peter’s face and a deep sensation of panic tearing at Tony’s insides.

The polarities between the rapidly diminishing relief and his agitated panic are dizzying, so Tony focuses on continuing the journey to the compound instead of losing himself to the panic again.

It works for all of two minutes once they’re flying again. Despite how much he wants to focus on their journey to medical, the flecks of blood on Peter’s cheeks and the drying lines that had trickled from his mouth steal all his attention. He hates how the gore marks Peter’s too-innocent face, the once childlike and endearing roundness of his cheeks now a haunting reminder of just how young he is.

And he’s dying. He can see frothy blood bubbling up between Peter’s lips and it makes his chest feel just that little bit tighter. Peter’s inhales and exhales are growing shallow and stuttering, the wetly gurgling noises turning quiet. Arguably, it’s worse than the choking.

He should have taken FRIDAY’s offer on the fucking breathing exercises before the panic set in this far.

_Breathe in for four seconds… Hold for seven. Exhale for eight seconds. Repeat._

_Breathe in for four seconds… Hold for seven. Exhale for eight seconds. Repeat._

_Breathe in for four seconds…_

He’s had such good control over his anxiety recently. And now it’s ruined. Part of him wants to be mad, but can’t be. Not now, anyways. Not now. Determination strengthens his resolve as the Compound comes into view, and there’s no words for how relieved he is at the sight. _Hold for seven._ Landing on the ground is… Not as reassuring, given that Peter’s chest isn’t moving up or down anymore. There’s already a full medical team waiting, Helen at the forefront beside a stretcher, but Tony is just maybe a _little_ more preoccupied by the kid in his arms. _Exhale for eight seconds._

“Oh, holy fuck. Is he-?”

_‘He’s still breathing. Without medical treatment-’_

“He won’t be. I know. Release the suit at the back, but keep the _front of the suit stable_ . Do _not_ drop him.” _Repeat._

The suit’s mechanical parts open up at the back enough for Tony to be able to step out, fixing the cufflinks of his suit out of anxious habit. He winces at the smeared blood that he can see when the armour closes back up, trailing from the top of one shoulder down to the shoulder blade. That had to have been from when Peter chucked up.

The front of the suit had fared a lot better — he’s grateful he doesn’t have to be in the suit for it to still be able to hold things —, but the blanket surrounding Peter had _not._ There’s dried blood coating enough of the fabric to make Tony’s heart skip a beat.

He walks around to the front of the suit and holds his arms out so that they rest under the arms of the empty Iron Man armour.

“FRIDAY, have the suit lower Peter into my arms. _Slowly._ Don’t hurt him.” He can hear quiet whirring as the servos in the suit’s arms gently lower Peter into his arms. The kid is unnaturally light for being so strong, so it’s almost a surprise when he hardly struggles to carry him, even in the blanket.

There’s a tight pang of something deep in his chest when he looks down at Peter in his arms, swathed in a blanket. It could almost be something paternal, Tony’s concern, if it weren’t for the fact that Peter is technically dying.

Oh, god, and isn’t _that_ a thought? The kid’s just _slipping away,_ right in front of him. Losing all that oh-so important blood. Fading away into nothing, even though he’s just a kid and still has his own life yet to be explored.

He shudders.

Tony uses a whole lot of effort to make sure that he lies Peter down on the stretcher gently, taking the time to unwrap him from the blanket and press the kid’s limbs to rest against his body. He ignores how tiny and vulnerable Peter looks, and he definitely ignores the hot, choking flush of protective instinct that comes up in his chest.

Peter is so _small._ And fragile. For what feels like the millionth time that day alone, he is forced him to remember just how young the kid is, and the contrast of it against his injuries makes Tony’s stomach churn.

He watches, the pit of dread in his gut steadily expanding, as Peter’s limbs are secured to the stretcher. Having never seen any kind of silence or stillness from the kid… he doesn’t want to see him like this ever again.

As soon as Peter is secure on the stretcher, the other medics and Helen are running towards the medical wing. Tony breaks into a sprint with them. He doesn’t want to watch Peter go alone. They’re yelling things at each other that he doesn’t understand before they’re forcing the operating room doors open and Tony knows he can’t run any further. They disappear beyond where he can be of any use. He ignores the cold, seeping feeling of inadequacy that’s become oh-too familiar over the years crawling back into his veins.

The corridor of the medical wing falls silent after that. Tony knows that the abstract _thing_ running through his veins has to be shock, because holy _crap,_ he could lose Peter for this. The kid basically killed himself to make up for his own mistakes. Should he be angry or scared?

He shakes his head and tries to focus on sucking in each breath in a regular order— not like the slightly winded gasps escaping him at the minute. Now is _not_ the time to be dwelling on the problem, because he can’t do anything about it, and as much as he hates to do nothing and relinquish Peter’s fate to someone who isn’t himself, he knows he has to. It’s a control issue he is aware of and despises, but his fingers still tingle with the urge to do _something_ to help the kid, because that way if they lose him he wasn’t useless.

Yeah. Being unable to do anything to save the people he cares about — Rhodey’s fall in Germany, Pepper being infected with Extremis, Happy getting caught in the explosion back with the Mandarin — has left him crippled in the face of these situations. He’s aware.

Tony wearily scrubs his face with his sleeve, every year of his life suddenly a weight on his shoulders. _Jesus._ Howard definitely didn’t give him any top tips when it comes to taking care of a teenager. He spins on his heel and starts his journey into the depths of the compound, away from the medical wing. He knows he’s useless there, so he won’t dwell on it. His feet take him towards the common room that the Avengers might once have occupied, together as a family. It’s empty now. Quiet. Lonely.

Tony really does miss them. He wishes it could have ended differently.

(He doesn’t know if he’s talking about his parents or the Avengers.)

Then again, it’s Rogers’ duplicity _(searching for the man who killed his parents off Tony’s own back, right before stabbing him there)_ that really pushed him over the edge, and the Avengers had been using him as a scapegoat since the beginning, but were content to take his tech and his home and his money and his trust for granted and use it for their own gain. So maybe that ‘family’ wasn’t all Tony had chalked it up to be. Maybe he just didn’t want to think that another group of people were taking him for granted.

Ugh.

It’s on autopilot that Tony makes his coffee, well-worn instincts driving his tired fingers to work the machine into spitting out something consumable. Tony looks out on the room from behind the island, slowly sipping at the too-hot mug. Once upon a time, the room would not have felt so huge and desolate; suffocatingly lonely against the rest of the otherwise lively compound.

He knows that Vision is often out travelling around New York, exploring the world surrounding what little he knows. He’s happy for him, really, ‘cause Vision is part JARVIS and JARVIS is- _was_ one of the only things he’s unreservedly loved his whole life. Vision deserves to learn more about the world he lives in. Rhodey spends most of his free time at the compound. Pepper is out at work, running SI like the professional she is, and he _was_ trying to fix up the Accords a little more.

Not quite for the Rogues, though. Getting them back on American soil is one thing, but the work he’s doing is for the other supers that might eventually consider joining. _The New Avengers._ They’re the future, after all.

The _old_ Avengers, however- He doesn’t know where they are. They’re out of the RAFT, great, but also… after _that_ fight, Tony really isn’t interested in interacting with many of them, if any at all. They’re probably with Rogers. And who knows where Rogers is? Tony has the crappy phone Steve gave him, so that doesn’t really matter. He doesn’t really care that much. _That_ wound is still too raw.

He sips his coffee and stares out into the room.

Unfortunately, real life isn’t like a movie, where there would be a handy cutscene right around now so he can skip forward to being able to see Peter. But time continues to pass, silent and encroaching, each second drawing by agonisingly slowly. With nothing to occupy his time, waiting is hellish. Tony’s brain is more than happy to supply some mental images of a tiny, broken Peter, mottled bruising and blood spilling from mouths and the _what-if_ s that plague his anxiety — what if he hadn’t been there? Peter would have died, away from everyone he loved. What if Peter had taken just a _little_ longer to collapse? Tony would have left by then, and the kid would have died alone. What if the Vulture guy didn’t stop at splitting the ferry? It could have been so much worse.

But it’s bad enough now, because there’s a kid fighting for his life under _Tony’s_ guidance and there’s a chance he won’t pull through.

What if Peter dies anyway? His injuries seemed bad enough-

Tony places the empty mug of coffee down on the island as gently as he can. That train of thought is _bad_. He can’t let himself stray like that. Besides, the kid has a healing factor and the best of the best looking after him. His chances of surviving are pretty high. He just has to think positive about this.

His left arm trembles.

God, this is so fucked up. Peter’s a kid. Just a kid. _Fifteen._ Nobody should have to suffer under the weight of so much responsibility at such a young age. Sure, he fucked up. He made a mistake, trying to take Toomes by himself. But now, now that everyone else is safe _but_ Peter…

And his Aunt probably has no clue where Peter is. Tony wars with himself for a few seconds on what he should do about that — does he tell her Peter lost track of time interning? No, he can’t do that. Peter couldn’t talk to his Aunt like this, and she will definitely want to talk to the kid. Does he tell her about Peter being Spider-Man? No, he couldn't. It’s not his secret to go around telling, especially when the kid only keeps the secret to protect her. He couldn’t hurt them both like that. The only option left is undesirable, but the only one that would hold up to scrutiny. He just has to think of a semi-viable excuse as to why her nephew is hospitalised when he should be in school. Easy.

It takes about half an hour for him to think of something that might work. It takes even longer for him to muster up the will to call Peter’s Aunt. He moves to do it several times, but doubt always pulls his arm back right before he calls her number. What if she doesn’t buy it? What if Peter doesn’t pull through?

What if this has all been for nothing? What if he’s come to care for Peter, only to lose him just after? It’s not like _that_ hasn’t happened before. He takes a shuddering breath in an attempt to recompose himself. Peter will be fine. He’ll pull through, and once he’s healed, Tony can talk to him about superhero-ing and how to do it properly. But, these things have to be dealt with one step at a time.

He runs as many situations as he can through his head, all things to explain to his aunt why he’s so hurt. He was on the ferry? No. Mugging? No, the injuries don’t match up. Accident at the compound? He thinks about this one. He _hates_ having to be dishonest to a woman who doesn’t deserve the pain, but it’s the only viable cover for Peter’s identity that _might_ stand up to scrutiny. With a heavy heart, Tony picks up his phone. FRIDAY brings up May’s number when he asks for it, which makes it slightly easier. He just has to jump into this head first. It’s not that hard, is it?

His heart is pounding in his chest as the phone rings. He should have left Peter to his devices. His involvement only brought the kid- actually, that’s not right. Peter would have gotten involved in this Vulture mess, even if Tony hadn’t come into his life with Germany and all. It makes thinking about the situation just slightly less destroying. At least Peter had the better suit when fighting the Vulture. Tony takes a deep breath as the line picks up, and a clear voice comes through.

“Hello? Who is this?”

“Uh, hi, Ms. Parker. It’s Tony Stark, for Peter’s internship?”

“Peter’s internship- Oh, right. What’s up?” Tony’s throat tightens. He coughs quietly to clear it, because _May doesn’t know Peter is under the knife._ The guilt slams into him again, hard, and for a second it’s impossible to comprehend how he is going to shatter her mood by informing her that her nephew is hospitalised, maybe even worse.

“I need to talk to you about something.” It comes out quieter than he would have liked. More shaky and frail than he’s comfortable with. Maybe she can tell that something’s up now, because the background noise dies down and her voice clears further.

“What is it? Did Peter do anything? Actually, do you have Peter? He’s not picking up.” _There’s_ the dread. Briefly, Tony reconsiders telling her. Maybe he can just tell May that Peter is busy at work? But no. That isn’t right. She deserves to know Peter’s hurt, even if the exact circumstances aren’t correct.

“He’s with me. I- I have him up here at the compound.”

“Oh, that’s good. Ned told me he wasn’t at school, said he left to do something. Wouldn’t tell me what. Don’t tell Peter, but that freaked me out a little. He always tells me I worry too much…” It’s a gentle kind of warming, mellowed by his upset, that he notes the similarities between Peter’s nervous rambling and May’s.

“Listen, May-”

“I’m sorry, I just- this doesn’t feel right. I know Peter’s been acting odd recently, but… I dunno. Can I talk to him please?” Deep breaths. It’s not that hard, he just needs to take deep, slow breaths.

He’s not really sure how he can explain this. Tony pinches his nose, exhaling softly, “He can’t talk right now. Look, May, please. I need you to listen to me.”

“Why can’t Peter…? Something’s wrong. What’s happened? Why isn’t Peter picking up his phone?” It’s easy to pick out the rising hysteria in May’s voice. She can definitely tell something is very, _very_ wrong by now. Tony rubs at his temple with his free hand.

“I need you to just… stay calm, okay? Before I tell you anything else, I need you to listen to me: Peter will be fine. Okay? He’ll be fine.” He raises his hands placatingly, only to belatedly realise that May can’t see the reassuring gesture. He drops his hands and absently stares at the trees, leaves gently swaying in the wind, and focuses on his breathing.

 _“‘Will be’?_ Oh, _god.”_

“Just… I need you to breathe, and I need you to know that he’ll be okay. He’s up here with me at the compound, and he’s in the safest hands we have.” Having to tell her has made this all too real to him now. Before, it was distant, like a nightmare. But now? Now he has to face the reality that he cares about Peter more than he’d care to admit, and the damn kid’s urge to impress — or is it the urge to not follow orders? — has him wound up like this. It’s all very upsetting.

“Oh, god. I-I’m sorry, I just need… a second…” The line move away from May’s voice for a few seconds. Tony waits patiently. She’s understandably freaking out about this. He won’t begrudge her needing time to recompose herself. He can hear faint, exotic sounding words that might be Italian, but they’re muffled slightly by a teary throat. It’s nearly enough to stop him breathing. She’s crying, and she doesn’t even know what’s wrong yet. _It’ll only get worse._ “O-okay. Please, just… what happened to him? Is- is he okay?”

Tony takes a deep breath. “T-there was an accident. At the compound. Nobody’s dead.” Technically not incorrect, given that nobody died during the kerfuffle on the ferry. He blanches a little as his memory throws a particularly vivid image of Peter’s collapsed form at him.

 _“‘Accident’?_ I- _Peter_ \- He’s hurt, isn’t he?” He shakes his head. If only she knew.

“I’m sorry. They have him in surgery now. They’re optimistic he’ll pull through and recover 100%, but… someone needed to tell you.” He _hates_ how detached his voice sounds. How unaffected and unemotional he must seem to May, delivering _that_ news with a facade of calm. He can hear May starting to cry over the phone, a series of muffled words escaping her before she raises the phone back to her mouth.

“He’ll pull through?” The hope in her voice is palpable.

“We only have the best medics up here. Trust me, he’ll pull through. They won’t let him go, I promise.” It feels like he’s full of promises he might not be able to keep today. That’s twice he’s promised to keep the kid alive today alone.

“How bad was it?” Her voice is thick with tears; nothing more than a whisper. _It’s bad. It’s very, very bad._

“It… wasn’t pretty. There might not be any long lasting damages, but… I don’t know many specifics. He should recover quickly. You know what- I’ll send a car for you to come here. Does two hours time sound good?”

“I’m at home. Just- I need to be up there as soon as possible. I have to be there.”

“An hour, then. I’ll keep you posted, Ms. Parker, I swear.”

“Thank you so, so much. You don’t- You don’t know how much it means for me to get up there for him…” A quiet sniffle comes through the phone again. “Okay- Okay. Thank you.” The phone line clicks down. He stares down at his phone for a few seconds before he wearily stands up, feeling every year of his age.

“FRIDAY, could you send a car down to the Parker residence? Actually- send Happy down. He knows the way already. Tell him it’s urgent for him to be there as fast as possible.” He thinks for a few seconds. “Fuck it. Scrap that order, FRIDAY, I’ll call him myself.”

_‘Order cancelled.’_

“Thanks, sweetheart.” Tony paces the length of the room with a sense of haste. It’s a better way of managing his anxiety than bottling it up, for sure. Even if he is wearing a new tread into the carpet. He dials Happy’s number and waits impatiently for the man to pick up.

 _“Happy here. What’s up?”_ The other man’s voice is remarkably free of the sadness that’s been trailing him since he got to Peter. It takes a few seconds for Tony to realise that’s because Happy doesn’t know yet.

“I need you to drive to the Parker residence and bring the kid’s aunt up here.” It’s abrupt and probably came off as rude, he knows this. But Happy’s had _years_ to get used to his rudeness, and it’s slightly more important to get May up here than to be polite.

_“I’m sorry?”_

“The kid’s aunt? She needs to come up here. You already know the way, so it’s easier to send you down.”

 _“Why?”_ Tony rubs at his temple; just about where a migraine is starting to form. This is so fucked up.

“Have you seen the news? With the ferry?”

 _“Yeah, why- oh. Oh. You saved the kid’s ass, right? Why’s his aunt coming up here for? Is he grounded?”_ Some small, hysterical part of him wants to laugh at that. _Grounded._ It would be a whole lot easier if the kid were just grounded. But no, the kid’s _dying._ What’s the difference, right?

“Happy… he tried to hold the whole damn _boat_ together by himself. He’s hurt, bad.”

_“Shit, the whole…? How bad was it? On a scale of one to ten?”_

“Coughing up blood and completely unresponsive. Maybe a _fifteen_.” His voice comes out a lot flatter than he wants it to. He just can’t find the energy in himself to try to respond more nicely. It’s not a joking matter.

_“Shit. He’s in medical?”_

“Under the knife as we speak. He’ll- he’ll be fine though. I’ve told his Aunt he’ll be fine. He has to be. Or I’ll drag his ass back here myself.”

 _“His Aunt’ll probably join you. There were no casualties on the boat though, were there? I’d hate for that to be the news he comes back round to.”_ He blinks. It’s a goddamn miracle that nobody else got hurt. Peter’s lucky he’s getting out of this without psychological trauma to rival Tony’s own. God knows how that would affect the kid’s already-present guilt complex.

“No, no casualties. Miraculously, he’s the only one who got hurt.” Tony sighs, and stops pacing to stare out the window. “Happy, I… I don’t know what I’m meant to do about this.”

_“How’d you mean?”_

“He fought the Vulture, even when I told him not to. He disabled the suit’s tracker. I can’t just let him… I can’t just leave that as it is. I have to do something about it.”

 _“Recovering will be a punishment enough, if it’s as bad as you say.”_ He winces. That’s true. If- No, _as_ Peter recovers… it won’t be quick, or easy. Tony can hear a car’s engine starting up through the phone. _“Take the suit, if you have to.”_

“I’ll save that for when Peter’s awake, when I can ask him what the fuck he was thinking.”

_“Yeah. Listen, I have to get driving now. I assume I’m going as fast as legally possible?”_

He nods. “Yep. Thanks for doing this, Hap.”

 _“It’s my job, Tony.”_ That statement in itself is close to a warm goodbye for them, so Tony clicks down the phone. The resounding silence, he decides, is not pleasant. Tony Stark lives a life of bright colours and lights, loud noises and rich experiences. The quiet… he’s not used to it. He doesn’t like it. It’s not loud enough to drown out his thoughts.

He sits down again, and he thinks. Happy is going to get May. Nobody else was hurt. The ferry got pieced back together, and while it’ll definitely have to get a new paint job (and probably be redesigned), it’s all okay. The only thing that isn’t okay is Peter. Tony leans further back into the cushions and clutches slightly at his arm. It’s shaking. So, he analyses the situation: Peter deactivated his tracker, and tried to take on the Vulture alone. He got into a fight, and then the ferry got split open. By this point, he had already called the feds and was on his way in to help. He couldn’t have done anything more to protect the kid, both from the Vulture and himself. Should have made the tracker harder to remove, though. He sighs. It feels like that’s all he does now.

It’s difficult to think when he’s so swamped down by everything that could have been done differently. He’s an engineer, spotting and fixing problems is what he does best. So why didn’t he see this coming? There was obviously the fact that Peter is a _teenager_ to take into account, and a super-powered teenager no less. And Tony just gave him a suit that was better than his old one and left him to it. He could have done more. Maybe if he took more time out to make sure the kid wasn’t going to do anything stupid…? The complete and utter ignorance of the kid’s messages to Happy definitely didn’t help. He read them, but did he respond? No. Maybe taking the time to make Peter feel validated, or like he was doing _something_ right could have stopped this from happening. Once again, someone he cares about has gotten hurt on the behalf of communication issues. Maybe if he payed more attention to Peter at that party, when he first told Tony about the Vulture, instead of telling him to stay away when his moral compass wouldn’t let him, maybe then this wouldn’t have happened. There’s so much that he could have done to prevent this.

Peter just wanted to do something right. There’s nothing wrong with that, is there? After all, that’s what Tony does. He writes it off as a _‘I should have been there for him’_ and adds it to the long list of mistakes he’s made. It’s not just his fault though. He’s seen the kid’s test scores. He knows that Peter is a genius. Peter, however, should have known that the Vulture wouldn’t go down easy. He should have just let the feds take care of it.

Tony blinks. _The Vulture._ He got away. _Think._ There’s got to be at least fifteen different ways he can track the bastard down from here. _The baby monitor protocol._ That should have been recording everything Peter saw. Maybe if he can get the suit from the medics, he can go through everything. Run through all that data. Find out where these guys have been operating from, and take them out nicely and cleanly. That weapon, made of the Chitauri equipment, split the ferry open. It’s a huge risk to the public, and they must have been operating now for at least five years without anyone coming for them. It’s time for that to change. Who knows what they could do if they got their hands on any of his tech-

Wait. All the little pieces fit together in his head. For the Vulture and whoever else to have been on that ferry, something must have been happening. Transportation of goods? And- And Peter sabotaged that. So the Vulture guy didn’t sell any tech, and probably lost the rest of it, right? Tony stands upright. He needs to get that suit back from medical. He needs the data, because if his hunch is right (and they usually are), the big moving of equipment from Stark Tower up to the compound in a couple of days time is a massive target. He can’t get the suit until Peter is out of surgery, though. And getting the suit… it’s slightly less important than making sure Peter is okay.

He doesn’t know what he can do until then. Pepper is hard at work, like he _should_ be. Happy is out. Rhodey — actually, Rhodey is in the compound. Somewhere.

Once again, he stands abruptly. This time, however, he starts walking deeper into the compound. He can chat with Rhodey while he waits for everything to stop being so messed up. The hallways pass in a blur as he walks, lone footsteps echoing around menacingly. Everything seems so empty when there’s nobody to walk with him. Tony shakes his head, maybe a little too harshly, and picks up the pace. He’s thought about the Avengers’ splitting up more times than he can count at this point. What could have gone differently? What could have been done to prevent that all from happening? Over and over, day in and day out, he’s tried to find ways that it all could have stayed together. It’s a problem of his that’s driven people mad, overanalyzing things. But he’s always done something wrong whenever he has something good. Whenever he gets to be a part of something amazing, it crashes and burns. Maybe, if he focuses on these things enough, one day he’ll be able to avoid the inevitable. Maybe one day, when he becomes part of a family, it won’t all fall apart.

Maybe.

(It wasn’t really a proper family anyway, was it? Families don’t keep secrets like _that._ Families don’t let one person take the blame _every_ time.)

Tony swerves sharply down the corridor to his left until the door belonging to Rhodey’s room comes into view. Tony just really, really hopes he’s in there. He won’t survive the silence if he isn’t. He knocks quietly.

“Rhodey?” He listens out quietly for any noises coming from within the room, and curses his lack of super-senses. He thinks he might hear a muffled bang, and then-

The door cracks open, and Rhodey’s eyes lock with his own. Tony can feel his long time friend checking him over, and that’s the first sign that _maybe_ he isn’t projecting his unflappable persona as brilliantly as he normally would. So instead of keeping up the walls he would in the face of the public, he drops them in the face of his friend.

“Can I come in?” It goes against the majority of his instincts to be vulnerable like this. But Rhodey- Rhodey is his _friend._ Rhodey has been there since the beginning, since he first became Iron Man, and he hasn’t left since then, even through everything that’s happened. He’s pretty sure that if he can’t trust someone after that, he can’t trust anyone in general.

“It’s your house, man. Sure thing.” Tony steps into the room. It’s a peaceful kind of quiet, even as he hears Rhodey’s shuffling footsteps behind him.

“Thanks, Rhodey. I just- I don’t want the quiet right now.” His shoulder is clapped lightly as Rhodey sits next to him on the bed. The contact is reassuring.

“No problem. Just if you’re wondering- I won’t push you about it yet. You can just chill out in here for a while now.”

Tony sighs in relief. “Thanks.” Gesturing at Rhodey’s legs, he asks, “How’s the leg braces working out for you?”

He’d be lying if he said he didn’t feel shitty about that. He knows he couldn’t have done anything more to help Rhodey, both before and after his impact, but… guilt doesn’t listen to logic. It never has.

“They’re doing great. I can move around for longer now, and a bit more smoothly, so…” Tony’s expression must give something away, because Rhodey looks up at him with a warmly exasperated expression. “Hey, c’mon. Don’t do that. We’ve been over this, Tony, you did everything you could. Hell, you designed these leg braces, didn’t you?”

He looks up sharply. Rhodey has a valid point — he always does —, but it just seems like nobody can see him like he sees himself. Everyone sees the _great_ Tony Stark for what he can do with technology. His achievements. Maybe it’s his fault for only being able to see where he goes wrong.

“Yeah, but-”

“You’re still doing everything you can to make this easier for me, Tones. It’s not your fault I fell. What’s important is that you’re doing everything you can now, okay? Focus on that. You need to stop tearing yourself apart about these things.” There isn’t enough energy in him to stop Rhodey from pulling him into an aborted hug-like gesture. Tony’s grateful for the loose contact though, both as a reassurance and a way of keeping him grounded without feeling trapped. He always forgets that Rhodey saw the raw mess that came back from Afghanistan.

He returns the hug. He doesn’t do this often, but he just feels so lost right now. Jesus, what’s he come to? And this- this catastrophe started with a teenager being stupid. Tony wants to be mad at Peter for getting hurt and making him freak out; for forcing him into such a state of vulnerability, but he just can’t manage it. He pulls away from Rhodey with a long inhale.

“You wanna talk about it?” Rhodey is using what Tony’s learned to call his ‘therapist voice’. He recognises the tone a little too well, although it’s mostly from his old, lonely nights full of cheap booze and regret. It’s different for him now. He doesn’t have the vaguely toxic influence of the Avengers on his shoulders now. He has Rhodey, he has Happy, he has Pepper, and he has Peter. His life has never been more full and worth living, so he can put up with the therapist voice if it can stop him from slipping back into those destructive behaviours.

“I mean- no, but… I’m gonna. If I do one more stupid ‘ignore my feelings’ stunt, Pepper will kill me.” He hears Rhodey snorting a laugh, and then a hand claps down on his shoulder. The touch is grounding, and Tony relaxes into it.

“Probably. Do it at your own pace, man. I ain’t gonna push you or anything.” And _that’s_ the difference between Rhodey and every other half-assed therapist he’s seen before. There’s no rush here. He doesn’t _have_ to spill his guts immediately, he can wait until the thought is less unnerving. Really, he appreciates it.

“You sure you’re not a psychiatrist? You sound like every shrink I’ve ever been sent to.”

Rhodey squints at him. “That’s- that’s not funny.”

“Yeah, well, my funny is gone. Poof. Vanished.” Tony makes little gestures with his hands as he talks, mimicking something poofing into a cloud of dust.

“I can tell.”

“I’m just…” Panicked, dreading, fearing. “Stressed.”

“You’re allowed to be stressed if something’s gone wrong, Tony. It’s called being human.”

“Yeah, yeah…”

“This is obviously eating at you, man. If you wanna rant at someone, or just tell ‘em what’s happening, you can talk to me. You know that.” He sighs, and chews on the words he wants to say.

“Long story short, there was a massive fuck up today.”

“On a scale of one to ten, how involved are you?” Tony whips around to face Rhodes, face mock-offended as his hand comes up to his chest.

“ _I_ didn’t fuck up. I’m almost offended you’d think that, Platypus.”

 _“Tony…”_ Rhodey’s tone is warning, and Tony deflates. Try as he might, he can’t just hide this behind his tendency to be annoying.

“Alright, calm down. Yeesh. So there’s a big fuck up that I didn’t cause. I said that already. And, people could have gotten really hurt.”

“You’re more upset about this than you normally are.”

“Yeah, well- here’s the fun part. I didn’t fuck it up, but someone I know did. And it was super, _super_ dumb on his part, but I can see why he did it.”

“Who was it then? Was it one of the Rogues or something? I swear, if Rogers is even _thinking_ about coming back here I’ll beat his star-spangled ass into the _floor-”_

“Whoa, woah! Calm down, Rhodey! Jesus. It’s not Cap or his Rogues. It’s-” Tony has to stop himself there, and quickly takes the time to put his emotions back in check before taking a deep breath and continuing.

“You know that kid I brought with me into Germany during the whole Accords mess?”

 _“Empire Strikes Back_ kid? The one you’re mentoring now, right? Spider-Man or something.”

“Yeah, him.”

“What about him? Wait, _he_ did the fuck up? What’d he do?” Tony blinks, words caught in his throat. He doesn’t know how he’s going to go about this. How does he explain that he’s starting to care more about this super-powered teenager than he should? Tony shakes his head and looks up to the ceiling.

“FRIDAY, can you put the TV on and scan through recent news reports, keyword: _‘Spider-Man’.”_

_‘11 results found within the past month.’_

“Search through those for reports discussing a ferry.”

 _‘2 reports found.’_ And the TV cuts to shaky footage of Peter holding the boat together. It’s obviously recorded on a phone, and he can just hear shocked yells and cries over the roaring of the water below. Watching now, Tony can see the way Peter was struggling so hard to keep it together under the forces acting on the boat. Without the adrenaline and anger surging through him to balance it out, watching the footage is harrowing. He blinks in shock when the footage keeps rolling, even as the boat starts to come back together and Peter descends on his webs. _He didn’t see this part._ Tony can’t see his face, but the way the eye lenses of the suit squint and blink is enough to tell him that Peter was surprised about this. He ignores the news lady’s voice over the top of the footage in favour of watching every movement Peter makes. It’s confusing, because he doesn’t _act_ like he’s hurt. He’s still moving around smoothly as he makes sure everyone is okay. It has to be the adrenaline keeping him going. It shouldn't be possible, but it happened.

Then he falters. It starts as a slight tremble in the hands as Peter helps up someone that had fallen over. Then it’s a stumble as he tries to walk. Peter lifts up his hands and looks at them briefly, drawing back slightly in shock as both limbs tremble noticeably.

And Peter drops to the floor. The camera is suddenly pointing up at the roof of the ferry, and there’s an explosion of noise through the audio before the footage cuts. Tony wait until a grainy image of Peter and the Vulture fighting is displayed on the TV before pausing it and looking back to Rhodey, who has an expression of concern on his face.

“You got him out, right?” Tony huffs, a small noise in the quiet of the room, and fiddles with his hands.

“Obviously. He’s in medical now. It was bad. It was really bad.”

“I- I can imagine. Jesus, Tony.”

“I just- I told him to stay away from that Vulture guy. He didn’t listen. He took the tracker out of his suit so he could do the one thing I told him not to do, and now he’s… you saw. I don’t know what to do.” It’s probably a lot for Rhodey to take in at once, especially as he doesn’t have the rest of the information like Tony does. But he needs to vent, and Rhodey said he’d listen, so…

“Don’t think about that for now, Tones. Just- Wait until you know he’s okay. Just wait until he’s awake so you can talk to him about it. Don’t go dishing out punishments just yet. You might not know everything about the situation.” That’s actually a pretty valid point. Tony commits it to memory. He should go about this as calmly as he can, even if he’s angry. He should be understanding.

He shouldn’t be Howard.

Sometimes he forgets how useful it is to talk to other people. It’s definitely better than being stuck in the quiet with his thoughts and anxiety eating away at him.

“You mind if I stay here a while longer? I don’t have anything to do while I wait.” Besides, he hasn’t had time to speak to Rhodey properly in what feels like years. Since before the Accords, at the very least.

“Sure thing, man.” Tony tries at a half smile and settles into the plush material of the bed beneath him. There’s a few minutes of contemplative quiet in the room after, and it’s kind of relieving, kind of not. He just feels a little too distant from reality right now.

“How’s it going with fixing the whole Accords clusterfuck?” Tony blinks his eyes open to squint at Rhodey questioningly.

“It’s… it’s going as well as it can, I guess. Ross is fighting me on every move, but I think they’re starting to sway on at least letting the Rogues back in the country. I can see why Bruce hated him now. Stubborn, stuck-up, arrogant bastard. ‘The Avengers are causing too much damage’ my _ass_ , they literally tried to _nuke_ New York in 2012. I should bring that up, actually. Imagine how that’d go down. ‘ _You’re a bunch of hypocritical asshats’_ probably won’t go over well with them right now.”

Rhodey snorts. “Probably not, Tones.”

It’s nice to spend time with his brother in all but blood. It’s a pressure off his shoulders to not have to worry about everything, to just be himself. It’s rare that Tony just gets to _be_. At least for a while, he can pretend that everything isn’t completely fucked. But still, maybe he isn’t meant to be still for more than a few minutes at any given time. The urge to move around or do something is starting to simmer in his veins again. It takes all of a few minutes of comfortable silence for it to become too much to ignore.

“Have you had PT today? Are you going to?” He can see a small smirk coming up to Rhodey’s face at the question. He has half a mind to throw the pillow behind him at the man.

“Nah, today’s a break day. Feeling restless there?”

“When am I not? Wanna take a walk?” Tony stands up, stretches, and helps Rhodey into a standing position. There’s a dull pang of guilt in his chest at his proud friend’s inability to complete such a simple task by himself now. Tony knows Rhodey is getting better, slowly but surely, but it still hurts to see.

“Yeah, why not? I’m down to go for a walk around the place.” Tony claps his friend on the shoulder and moves towards the door, miming holding it open despite the fact that it’s automatic.

“Such a gentleman, Anthony.” This forces an actual snort from him, despite his upset about everything. The sheer sarcasm in Rhodey’s voice is something he hasn’t heard in _years,_ and it brings back pleasant memories from a time where he _didn’t_ have to deal with shit like this.

He has to slow his pace numerous times as they walk towards the common room again. Although slow, the walk is pleasant and a soothing balm on his frazzled nerves. It helps that Rhodey keeps engaging him in lighthearted conversation — probably because he knows what Tony looks like when he’s drowning in his guilt — and generally keeping his head above the proverbial water. Part of him wants to protest as Rhodey moves to make himself a coffee, but the larger part of him knows that he would kick Tony’s ass for treating him like an invalid, so he sits down heavily on one of the couches and stares out the windows forlornly. His hands aren’t shaking anymore, which means the breathing exercises are working better than they were before, but the pit of dread in his chest has taken to steadily growing as time passes. The lack of information on Peter’s condition probably means he’s still in surgery.

No kid should ever have to be operated on under circumstances like these.

Tony sighs quietly and checks his phone. There’s a small blip saying Happy is nearly at the Parker residence, and he _really_ hopes that Peter will be out of surgery by the time May arrives. Everything still feels distant and far away. He knows everything will come back to him as soon as he knows Peter is okay, but it’s still odd.

“What you looking at?” Rhodey is making his way over to a couch, sitting down slowly with measured movements. Tony winces slightly and holds up his phone.

“Happy. I sent him to pick up the kid’s aunt and bring her here. I couldn’t just not tell her that her kid is in surgery.”

“Damn. Happy picked her up yet?”

“Not yet. Nearly. I just hope he’ll be out of surgery by then.” He takes hold of the steaming-hot mug of coffee Rhodey hands him, callused hands long since used to the extreme heat.

“Hey. You did everything you could, okay? He’ll pull through.”

“Yeah, I hope… I hope he does.”

“You’re overthinking this, Tones. You want a coffee? Some food? Anything to help you keep your mind off of this.”

“Nah. Don’t think I could keep food down right now.” And ain’t that the truth? Watching Peter drowning in his own blood, being unable to help without potentially making it worse… his stomach is still unsettled by the experience. It’s not just because that’s another kid getting injured due to a fault on Tony’s part — it feels much deeper than that, and to be ignoring his closeness to Peter feels like a grievance on his part.

He’s still confused at how deep rooted his mentorly-turning-paternal affection for Peter runs. He’s known the kid for what, a _week_ , and he’s already managed to get past years of emotional walls and defences that should have kept everyone out. It’s weird, but Tony isn’t sure if he minds it. It started in Queens by seeing the nervous, awkward teenage-ness behind the Spider-Man persona. Then, after Peter went down in Germany, it became a sort of reflexive thing to try to keep the kid out of danger. Mostly because of his reluctance to get anyone else hurt under his jurisdiction, but also… Peter just makes Tony want to protect him. Who knows why.

“He’s a good kid.” He blurts, rubbing his hand slowly. He means it though. Peter _is_ a great kid. No bad person would go help old ladies cross the street in their free time. Rhodey looks up from his coffee, interested.

“Hm?”

“Spidey. He’s a good kid. Doesn’t deserve to have to go through this.” Tony shakes his head lightly, more of a twitch than an actual movement.

“At the risk of sounding like a shrink, do you wanna talk about him? Will that help at all?” Tony blinks, and considers.

“I dunno. Maybe?”

“Then go ahead, man. Talk about things.” He searches through his memory for the things that make Peter endearing to him. There’s a lot of things there, but a couple stand out against everything else.

“He’s smart, for one. Remember in Germany, with the whole _‘Empire-”_

 _“‘Empire Strikes Back’_ thing? Yeah, I remember. Got to say, I’ve never seen that kind of brains on the field before.” Rhodey chuckles a little and sips his coffee. Yeah, that was a good plan, and an even better one for a _teenager_ to come up with when everything else was happening.

Tony laughs a little, “You mean the nerdy kind? Yeah. He’s a good fighter. You should see his test scores though. He’s basically a qualified genius already.”

“On a scale of average intelligence to you, how smart?” Tony hums a little at the comparison scale, but thinks about it anyways. He has to remember that Peter is a kid right now, too. Peter will surpass him one day, Tony knows it. Kid’s 15 and he’s made his own artificial spider webbing — the same spider webbing that a lot of big companies with genius-level think tanks can’t figure out yet. If that’s not a metric for potential, nothing else could be.

“Easily an eight. Maybe a nine, when he’s done in education.” And more than likely a 10 after. He’s got very few doubts about the kid, which is odd, because it’s only been a few days since he picked Peter out of Queens to help out.

Rhodey whistles. “An eight, huh?”

“Yep. He made those web shooters himself, before I made him the new suit.” Imagine his surprise when he got a closer look at Peter’s first web shooters. Made out of salvaged, old tech, but just as functional as Tony’s own. Little genius in science _and_ engineering, apparently.

“Damn. Guess I can see why you recruited him.”

“Yeah. He’s driven, too. Dunno why yet, but-”

He might not get to ask Peter why he’s so motivated to help people. Tony shutters, flinches, and stares down at the floor. The kid isn’t out of surgery yet. That can’t be good, right? If he was alive, he’d- he’d be done by now. Peter should be out by now-

“But?” Rhodey’s voice shakes him out of the oncoming panic attack. Right, right. The compound. Rhodey. Surgery. Peter. The ferry. Tony takes this information and grounds himself with it, curling and uncurling his fist in time with his breaths.

 _“God,_ I don’t know why I’m doing this. Makes him sound like he’s dead or something. Besides-”

A hand rests gently on his shoulder. Tony looks up into Rhodey’s eyes.

“Tony, in the nicest way possible, shut up. I can tell you care about him, man.”

If it was anyone else, he would have flinched. But this is _Rhodey._ His best friend. His _brother._ Rhodey won’t hold anything against him, ever. Not like this, at least. Tony takes a deep breath, and lets the words bubble up into his lungs. Now he just needs to let them out. Simple.

Ah, screw it. Rhodey’s heard all his Howard Stark horror stories before. What’s one more moment of vulnerability?

“I’m in too deep with this. I hardly know the kid but- I want to keep him safe from all _this._ He’s just a _kid._ He shouldn’t have to see all this by himself, not if I have the power to help him.”

“You care about him.” It’s more a statement than a question, but it hits the nail on the head. Tony nods slowly, wonderingly.

“Yeah.”

“And it’s weirding you out because you haven’t known him for very long but you still want to keep him safe.”

“You sure you’re not a mind reader?” Tony wearily drapes a hand over his eyes. “You coulda made a lot of money doing this.”

Rhodey laughs, the noise a friendly, inviting sound. Tony relaxes his shoulders.

“Maybe I could. Never too late for it.”

“Hah. Hobbies and careers, right?”

“Hobbies and careers.” Rhodey says seriously, nodding.

A few minutes pass, comfortably silent. Tony thinks carefully, letting feelings and thoughts wash over him. It’s weird, because he knows he hasn’t been this contemplative about anything in a long while. Big choices needs lots of thinking over — maybe that’s what his next words are. A choice. A chance to acknowledge how he feels about the situation, why he feels so connected to Peter.

And it clicks.

“I see myself in him. He’s like I was when I was a kid. I just- I don’t want him to turn out like me. He’s trying so hard to keep people — they’re not even people he knows, they’re strangers — to keep them safe.” Tony says each word calmly, all measured tones and carefully chosen words, testing the waters with the open declaration of emotions. To his credit, Rhodey takes it in stride and nods as he speaks, absorbing every word that comes from Tony and analysing it as a whole.

“That’s admirable, especially in a kid.” And isn’t it just? Tony has _never_ met another teenager trying so hard to make the world better place for strangers. Then again, he’s never met any super powered teenagers.

He’s also never met anyone like Peter Parker.

Tony sighs and goes back to his thoughts.

“Feel like I’ve fucked this all up. I’m meant to be his mentor, y’know? I- I’m trying to break the cycle of shame here. I don’t want to screw him up like Howard screwed me up. I’m _trying_ with this whole- with this mentoring thing. I want to help him out, like- like Howard didn’t help me out when I needed it.” He’s treading into deep, dangerous territory here. Rhodey is still watching him, eyes understanding. Tony has to take a breath to recompose himself. It’s just a kid. It’s just Peter. He doesn’t need to dig back into the Howard Stark trauma for him.

He does anyway.

“Look. I- I want to support this kid. I want to help him out, because I can. He’s my responsibility to take care of as his mentor, and I want to do a damn good job for the kid because Howard never did, and he’s just like I was. Hell, change a few things, and we’d be the same.” It doesn’t feel right to be talking to anyone about this. Normally, he would have just… drowned the problem in alcohol and made up for it when he got sober again, but… he’s not the same as he used to be. And this is _Peter._ He needs to be able to _think_ about this, so when Peter wakes up he doesn’t freak out or something.

“Tony. You can still do that for him. You just need to talk it out with him when he wakes up, okay? Don’t do anything rash, and just… be there for him, I guess. The kid obviously looks up to you as well.” Tony thinks back on the limited interactions he’s had with the kid. Yeah, he can say with certainty that the younger hero looks up to him. This whole kerfuffle- it’s just because of _that._ Peter wanting to prove himself.

“Yeah, I guess. I’ll- I- Goddamn it. I suck at this. I’m gonna make sure he’s fine when I can. Keep him alive so his Aunt can kill him.” That’s a much easier promise to keep for him. All he needs to do is make sure Peter gets the best medical care. Easily done. No need to feel guilty or anything.

“That’s all you can do, Tones.” Tony nods and leans back into the plush sofa, running a hand through his hair. It feels nice to have his thoughts off his chest, but without the distractions, worry is starting to creep back in.

“Yeah, I know. Now I just need them to get out of surgery before his Aunt shows up.”

“I’m sure he’ll be fine, Tony. You’re overthinking it.” Probably. Tony clicks his tongue and stares up at the ceiling. Running his eyes along the lines between the panels is entertaining, at least.

“Yeah, well…” His eyebrows draw inwards, deep in thought, “I’ve never had a kid before.”

Rhodey snorts. “You sound like a-” Despite the situation, a small smiles does come up onto his face. Rhodey definitely knows how to keep his spirits up in situations like this. But still, the comment is drawing a little close to the line, given the ‘Howard Stark is the shittiest dad’ talk.

“If you say dad, I’m going to freeze the next lift you’re in.”

“Oh, freeze me in a lift, will you? I went to MIT as well, Tony, I _will_ lock you out of your la-”

 _‘Boss, it’s Helen on the line.’_ As soon as FRIDAY’s voice interjects, the room falls silent. Tony can hear his heart beating in his ears. He sits bolt upright.

“Yeah?” His voice belies his panic.

_‘She wants you to go to the medical wing.’_

“Wait- Did she say anything else?”

_‘No.’_

The restless energy that’s been sitting in his veins has surged back up again. He has to move. Tony stands and looks to Rhodey questioningly. He can’t just ditch a friend like that. Rhodey, however, seemingly knows his conflict, as he looks up to meet Tony’s eyes with a knowing look.

“Tony. Go to medical.”

And that’s all it takes. Tony sets down the half-empty mug of coffee and exits the common room. His thoughts are just as on edge as they were when he initially handed Peter off, and he can’t help the sensation of unease rising in his throat. Do or die time. After having spent so much time panicking, now he’s about to find out if Peter- if he _survived,_ and he’s not sure if he even wants to know. What if the news he hears isn’t the news he’s looking for?

What if Peter _didn’t_ pull through?

Nobody is there to watch as his pace picks up to a jog.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi i did actually have to split this bad boy into smaller segments because the chapters are too Thicc without doing so lol


	2. The Incident, part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was never completely silent in the room — after all, it is in the ICU. The monitors are doing their jobs. The multitude of quiet beeps, whooshing of air and the steady beat of Peter’s heart through the monitor is more unnerving than it has the right to be. Tony is no expert on anything even remotely medical; but the slow pace of Peter’s heart can’tbe natural. He knows Helen said he lost a lot of blood, but… He’s pretty sure Peter can’t take transfusions, what with his super blood. Wearily, Tony runs a hand through his hair — it feels gross, probably from sweat — and keeps the other resting on his knee, not unwilling but unable to reach over and take Peter’s hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> can you believe i'm very gradually turning tony stark into a dad??
> 
> Anyways, thanks to everyone who's reading so far for your continued support! Every review means the world to me, and I'm working hard back here to make new chapters when I can! I promise there's good stuff coming up soon... ;)

His thoughts don’t really get any worse than that on the way through the corridor, but they don't exactly get any better, either. Focusing on keeping one leg in front of the other at an even pace is enough to keep him from overthinking it and descending into a panic. _Left, right, left, right left right left rightleftright-_

He knows he’s nearly running now, but he can’t find it in himself to care anymore. Tony sharply turns corners with a determination he’s hardly felt in a _long_ time, passing the all-too familiar hallways and openings until gray walls turn to white walls and the bright, clinical lights of the medical wing replace the ones in the rest of the building. Breathing heavily, Tony slows his pace back to a walk. He’s just lucky that hardly anyone is ever in medical, because it means nobody — will find out Peter’s identity — can see him running. He stops moving entirely in favour of looking for Helen. It’s not that difficult, given that she’s one of the few personnel in the medical wing at any given time. She sees him and beckons him over wordlessly.

His anxiety starts to scratch at his throat and stomach, and his sternum feels too heavy. That can’t be- she isn’t speaking, even as he moves over. That- _Peter-_ He shakes his head, maybe slightly too harshly. Those thoughts can back _off_ for good. Taking deep breaths to recompose himself, he stands straight in front of Helen.

Maybe she can see the desperation in his eyes. Maybe he isn’t hiding how much this is fucking him over. But her posture relaxes, and the professional coldness in her eyes softens slightly. Tony tenses a little. Is that a good or a bad thing? All the anxiety, all the panic and the dread all surge forward within an instant, and it feels like a solid punch to the gut. His breaths don’t come easy anymore.

Softly; breathlessly, even, he whispers: “Helen? Is he…?”

Her response takes what has to be eons.

“He’s alive.” And within that same moment that she speaks those words, the vice-like grip on his lungs releases, and he can suck in a breath again. _He’s alive._ He’ll be able to see the kid’s puppy-dog smile again. May will get to see her nephew again. _He’s alive._ Peter will get to go back to superhero-ing. He’ll get to see his friends again at school, and he’ll be able to grow up. _He’s alive._

Peter-

“Tony.” The quiet, somber word snaps him out of it. It’s spoken with too much precision. It’s said way too calmly and evenly.

All positive thoughts desert him.

“There was a… a complication.” The softness of her voice doesn’t sound reassuring anymore. It sounds like- it’s telling him, over and over, that something has gone really, _really_ wrong and it’s _bad._ The steady grip on his throat is back.

“What happened?” Tony doesn’t mean for his voice to come out as apathetic as it does, but… there’s been too many draining events in the past few hours, and he’s only got so much emotional durability. It doesn’t mean he doesn’t care. He does. He really, _really_ does.

It’s not because that shield of apathy is the only thing stopping his voice from cracking or something equally embarrassing.

“By the time you brought him in, he was already in hypovolemic shock. He lost a _lot_ of blood. He’s alive, but… we don’t know how long his brain was starved of oxygen for.” Tony takes a deep breath. Starved of oxygen. Possible brain damage.

“Oh, _shit.”_ Eloquent. “How is he?”

“He’s… in a medically assisted coma. It took a lot out of his system, and there was much too little blood in his body for the majority of the surgery. It was very taxing on him. He needs to recover, and he won’t be able to do that well enough without focusing _all_ of his energy into recovering.” The news hits him and he's left in a daze instantly; the world has turned slow and muted, his heart's pounding taking up the entire bandwidth of his brain.

_Coma._

Peter might not be able to bounce back from that. This- this coma- that might be his life. He might not ever come back to them fully. That’s worse than dying, isn’t it? Peter might not be dead, but if he isn’t the same person who went under… will he have _really_ survived? Tony grasps at his left hand. It’s shaking again. After taking a few seconds to curse his emotional attachment to the kid, he takes a breath.

If Peter recovers, Tony is _never_ letting him out of his sight again. _Ever._

“Can I see him?” His voice comes out a whole lot smaller than he intended. He shakes his head lightly and shoves his hands into his pockets. They’re still trembling. Helen looks at him, unsure, and rests a hand lightly on his shoulders.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea? It’s a big shock, and I’m not sure it’d be wise for you to see him right now. You _can,_ but… Tony,” And here her voice grows quiet again, “It won’t help him or yourself to beat yourself up over it. Especially after you see him.”

“I have to.” Tony’s voice is no more hushed than a whisper. “I owe him that much. I can’t just let him be alone in there, even if he is in a coma.”

The uncertainty in him is crushing. Sure, he wants to see Peter, if only to reassure himself that the kid isn’t dead. But he’s in a _coma_. No matter how much Tony wants him to be awake, he won’t be. He won’t be awake by the time May arrives. And that’s another thing to deal with in itself. Tony steels himself and straightens despite the dull ache of panic still running through him. He _has_ to.

“If it helps, you can talk to him. A lot of coma patients say they heard their loved ones talking to them while they were under. It might help.” He blatantly ignores ‘loved ones’. Maybe he’s in too deep with this. He should- he should pull back while he still can. He’s just the kid’s mentor, nothing more, nothing less.

He can’t do it. He’s not even sure if he’s really trying. Helen frowns slightly, but moves to the side nonetheless. The hallways suddenly seem way too long as they walk along, each footstep echoing loudly off the walls as the doors at the end draw closer. Something grips at his chest as he gets closer, maybe fear or reluctance, but he ignores it and keeps walking.

“You can sit next to him, if you’d like. Be careful of the tubes though.” Tony swallows harshly. _Tubes._ That means Peter is completely dependent on machines to keep him alive right now. The thought sits heavily in his gut. The door in front of him looks more foreboding than any door has the right to be; like it’s the only thing separating him from the embodiment of his own personal nightmare. It basically is.

“Thank you. For saving him, I mean. I don’t- I don’t know what I’d have done if I lost him.” The admission is small, but Helen doesn’t look at him any more judgmentally. She just has a look of compassion in her eyes as she meets his own.

“It’s my job, Tony. I can’t let a life go. Especially not someone as young as him.” Tony tries a smile, but he suspects it comes out as more of a grimace. He rests his hand against the door, flinching a little at the coldness, and looks to Helen. He feels off-balanced. He doesn’t even know why he’s looking to her for permission when she’s already given it. She nods at him once.

He rests his other hand on the handle, and presses the door open.

A hushed whisper of a memory echoes through his head. Pepper once told him, after some mission where he got really hurt, that nothing in life could ever prepare someone to see the person they love lying in a hospital bed, unresponsive. That seeing them is like a nightmare that you can’t wake up from.

The same sentiment seems to echo here.

His heart drops into his stomach. He’s still stood in the doorway, stuck firmly in place by what he sees in front of him.

He knew it’d be bad, but… _this?_ This is… this is…

Peter is almost as pale as the sheets below him, eyes ringed with firm black bruises and gaunt-looking. His expression is slack, which should be relieving because it means he isn’t in as much pain as he was on the flight over, but it also makes it startlingly clear just how bad it was. And that isn’t even starting with the tubes and machines surrounding him. He was so _hurt._ With his eyes closed like this, the dark bags, pale skin and machines… Despite every feature he put in the suit to protect this kid, it’s oh-too obvious now just how delicate and fragile Peter is beneath that mask of bravado and false confidence now that he’s relying on _machinery_ to keep him alive, and Tony feels all the worse for it. Suddenly, drinking that coffee before coming here seems like a terrible idea in hindsight. The relief that had surged up in his chest is long since dead, replaced by some crazy inability to suck in a breath.

This- there has to be some way he can fix this. He has to be able to do something to help Peter. He can’t just be _useless._ He can’t just let Peter stay like this.

Oh, god.

When he takes those first steps forward towards the hospital bed, the sensation feels alien. Like his blood got replaced with lead while he wasn’t looking, and now his limbs are too heavy and unwieldy to move. It’s like watching himself through a view screen, all distanced and separated from reality. Maybe that’s for the best, though. If he were _actually_ emotionally and mentally present, he’d probably do something stupid. Like cry.

_Stark men don’t cry._

Tony sits, maybe dropping down too heavily on the seat. It groans a little in protest to the sudden movement, but holds steady.

“Thank you.” Tony says. He’s not quite sure if he’s thanking Helen for dragging Peter through this, or thanking Peter for having the strength to survive. He doesn’t look up as Helen’s quiet footfalls draw closer, but stares at his clasped hands in his lap like a scolded child.

“Tony. This isn’t your fault, okay?” Slowly, Tony looks up. Helen’s eyes convey a compassion invisible through body language alone, and a small knot of tension unwinds between his shoulder blades.

“Alright.” The lie rolls smoothly off his tongue, like the millions he’s spoken before. Just another day. Just another thing to be compartmentalised and dealt with.

Just another child at risk of dying because of Tony Stark.

Except this time it’s not the weapons his _mind_ created hurting people, but the connection his _heart_ seems so dead set on maintaining that’s making this mess.

He should have never gotten involved. 

Although disheartened by the sudden darkening of his thoughts, Tony continues diligently listening to Helen as she speaks.

“Try talking to him, just like you would if it were a normal day. Physical contact with the patient might be beneficial to you both, so if you’re up to it, try that. Just go about this like he’s just napping.”

“Okay. And thank you, Helen. God knows where I’d be without you.”

“Alright, Tony. I’ll have a qualified team of physicians checking up on him ever so often, so you can get updates on his condition from them too.” Tony nods along as she speaks, perhaps too visibly tiredly, because Helen gives him a soft smile — it doesn’t quite reach her eyes — and exits, the door gently closing behind her.

And then he’s alone with Peter’s comatose body.

It shouldn’t be possible for him to feel _this_ awkward. Tony stays in his chair, but his spine is fixed into an uncomfortable position that he can’t quite find the energy to move out of. Today has been _exhausting,_ both physically and emotionally, and now the source of his emotional unrest is lying prone before him; Tony finds he can’t bring himself to do much more than focus on all the tubes surrounding Peter. It’s incredibly bizarre, for sure. There’s an overlying sense of fragility surrounding the boy now, like a single touch might shatter him or disrupt the faux-peace of the image.

And an image is exactly what this could be. The stillness, the sharp white walls, the quiet. Tony can compare this to numerous hospital-based reality TV shows he’s watched when drunk or bored. The atmosphere is the same though — sullen, delicate. Easily disturbed. Decidedly showcasing the vulnerability of a comatose child in a hospital, and driving that stake through Tony’s heart. Because that’s what Peter is right now. A _child,_ alone in the hospital without any _real_ family.

Tony shakes his head, perhaps slightly too hard as his temples protest the movement. Time to focus on something else, then.

It was never completely silent in the room — after all, it _is_ in the ICU. The monitors are doing their jobs. The multitude of quiet beeps, whooshing of air and the steady beat of Peter’s heart through the monitor is more unnerving than it has the right to be. Tony is no expert on anything even remotely medical; but the slow pace of Peter’s heart _can’t_ be natural. He knows Helen said he lost a lot of blood, but… He’s pretty sure Peter can’t take transfusions, what with his super blood. Wearily, Tony runs a hand through his hair — it feels gross, probably from sweat — and keeps the other resting on his knee, not unwilling but _unable_ to reach over and take Peter’s hand.

Touch always makes everything seem so final. And given how tiny and diminutive Peter seems to Tony’s brain, the idea of making contact seems foreign — what if he hurts Peter? What if he slips up and nudges something that shouldn’t be nudged?

So he just _sits._ He sits, and he waits. What for, Tony doesn’t know, but the thought of doing much more than that seems too energetically taxing right now.

 _“Shit,_ kid…” Tony rubs his face wearily, gnawing slightly on a finger. The sharp pain and slight tang of metal on his tongue as he breaks the skin jerks him to a halt.

“Just- just…” He stops, and he sighs. _God._

Looking at Peter — skinny, pale, gaunt, _just a kid_ — makes the anger from earlier surge back up, forcing its way up his throat like bile. Peter should have known better than to try to stop a ferry in motion. In fact, the kid’s refusal to even think of using his brain is what landed him in this situation. Tony doesn’t want to break the silence Peter so desperately needs to have in his rest, but the words are coming up before he can stop them.

“Where the fuck do I even start with this…?” He takes a shuddering breath. His anger has turned into a tangible sensation, a leaden weight on his chest and in his throat. He’s started to tap his fingers against his leg without even realising that he’s doing it. He can’t find it in himself to stop. All those emotions, everything he’s been holding back since seeing the ferry… it’s all coming back now.

“Jesus fucking christ, Peter- You messed up. You messed up big time. That stunt you pulled with the ferry could have easily killed people, and that would be on _you.”_ There’s no response asides from the soft noises the ventilator makes and the rhythmic beeping of numerous monitors. He knows the kid can’t respond, but it makes the pressure on his chest rise up, just a little bit. It’s not going to hurt anyone, his ranting. The kid could be what, 10 miles under for the amount of sedatives in him? He’s not hearing this.

“It’s a goddamn miracle that nobody got hurt except you. I told you to ignore this! I told you in no unsure terms to _stay on the ground_ and to _not_ fight the Vulture guy, who, by the way, I’m gonna get on my radar. As soon as he makes his move, we’ll have him. Don’t know who he is yet, but we’ll get him.”

That reminds him. He _does_ need to collect the suit from the medics. He’s not going to let some crazy bird guy steal his tech. He’s not letting his tech hurt any more innocent people. He sighs and looks at Peter again. He’s such a _small_ kid, all gangly limbs and so fragile-looking, like a breeze could knock him over. _Just a kid._ Tony has half a mind to berate himself for not noticing these things. He’s meant to be Peter’s mentor. He’s hardly seen anything from the kid since Germany. Peter’s a good kid, Tony knows this. He’s seen the messages Happy gets (all the time). He’s listened to the voicemails. Maybe that deep-set urge to help people is why he keeps getting hurt.

There’s so many things that could have gone differently, so many ways that the ferry problem could have been handled. He doesn’t really hold Peter’s head-first attitude towards the situation against the kid. He _did_ stop god knows how much incredibly dangerous weaponry from being let loose on the streets, and Tony would have done the same thing if it were him. It’s just… It doesn’t stop the anger in him though. Is it just because Peter didn’t listen, or is it because Peter not listening effectively prevented Tony from being able to ensure the damn kid’s safety?

The latter, most likely.

“I should take away your suit for this, I really should. You took the suit I built for you and tampered with it to complete a goal I told you to not set yourself. You have to learn your lesson, kid. You’re not invincible. You weren’t before you got the suit, and you’re not now. You can’t _magically_ be able to tackle big bads like this when you’re untrained and new to this whole thing just because you’re stubborn.” Then there’s the problem that’s arisen with the suit. He doesn’t know why Peter got so rash with his spider-ing. Maybe it’s because this Vulture guy is the first big time villain he’s seen? Maybe it’s because this guy is a huge threat to the general public. Definitely not because of a sudden surge of cockiness, because Peter is the singular most careful teenager Tony has ever met. Period. Tony rests his head in his hands. Never did he think he’d be at the bedside of a comatose child-hero. This territory is all very new to him.

“I don’t know what I’m meant to do with this. With you, even. I should tell May about your being Spider-Man _and_ take the suit.” He thinks about it. He doesn’t want to take away Peter’s choice to tell May about Spider-Man or take away the suit, but the kid has to learn somehow. “But I don’t think I will tell her. That’s your call. God, I- I don’t know what I’m meant to do with you. Right now? I think recovering from _this_ is gonna be punishment enough for you. I mean- You were coughing up blood, for God’s sake. You nearly died in my _arms._ I had to hold you so you could chuck up the blood stopping you from breathing, because your muscles are so damaged they can’t even keep you upright. Fucking _christ._ You messed up, big time. But…”

“Help me out here, Peter. Wake up.” Tony winces at the reminder that Peter is technically in a coma to allow his body to heal, so the one thing he definitely isn’t doing it waking up. He sighs.

That’s the first time he’s called Peter by his name, and the kid isn’t even awake to hear it. Shit.

Peter looks much younger asleep, and way too vulnerable with the tubes and machines surrounding him. Tony doesn’t know anything concrete about why any of these particular devices are there, but his gut is telling him that it’s all very bad, even though it’s obvious by itself. Tony mutters a sarcastic thanks to one Howard Stark for his emotional infancy. He doesn’t know how to cope with these things. But he _does_ know that Peter look defenceless and small, and _that_ makes Tony’s chest hot and uncomfortably tight; maybe more than a little protective.

“Fuck. I am so, _so_ sorry.”

And once the apologies start, they don’t stop.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t there to help out more. Actually, I’m- I’m sorry I shut you down. Shoulda listened, but…” He huffs a noise that could be a chuckle, but it’s heavy and leaves a bitter taste in his mouth. “I never do.” Tony laughs self-deprecatingly. There isn’t a response, aside from the slow rises and falls of Peter’s chest. It’s like something out of one of those hospital soaps, where the kid is the one who’s hurt and the adult is panicking; not quite sure how to express their feelings. It _hurts._

_Yeah._ With all the residual anger from earlier on in the day out of his system, Tony just feels… empty. What does anything achieve right now? Being _angry_ or _grieving_ isn’t going to bring Peter back out of his coma. The only thing he can really do now is just… be there, he supposes. Not that _that_ will really help Peter, either. So Tony leans back in his chair, and he stares at the ceiling. Maybe if he can think hard enough, he’ll be able to resolve this emotional clusterfuck before it gets too out of hand. It’s only when his phone, nestled deep in his pocket, starts vibrating that he jumps back to reality. With a flick of his wrist the phone is in Tony’s hand, and he’s answering.

“Hello?”

 _‘Tony, we’re here. The kid’s aunt is gonna be on her way up in about a minute. Just a heads up.’_ Happy’s voice is grim. Tony deflates slightly, despite himself. He’s not quite sure he’ll be able to handle May’s grief on top of his own.

“Thank you, Happy.” He sighs, fingers curling against his palm. He _could_ take Peter’s hand; offer some comfort, but… he doesn’t feel like that’s his responsibility to do. Nor does he feel like he’s deserving of it.

 _‘And Peter…’_ There’s a quiet noise over the phone, rustling papers or something, then Happy’s voice comes over again, noticeably more concerned than last time, _‘Is he out of surgery yet?’_

“He’s out.” Briefly, Tony hears Happy repeating the sentiment to May, and some quiet noise fades through the transmission. He can’t quite tell what is was.

 _‘And?’_ Tony bites his lip. If delivering the news to his _friend_ is this hard, then telling May…

“He’s- he’s in a coma. Medically induced. Something to do with major blood loss and oxygen deprivation; it’s so his body can fix itself. But he’s alive.”

 _‘Okay. Should I tell her?’_ He notes Happy’s use of ‘okay’ over the expletives he can hear on the tip of his friend’s tongue, if only because May is in the car with him. In the dark on the situation. 

“I’ll explain to her what’s happened. You just- thank you for bringing her here so quickly. It really means a lot, and I’ll get you-” Despite the genuine tone of his voice, he is still cut off by Happy. 

_‘You don’t need to get me anything, Tony. I may act like I don’t like the kid, but I do. Not that he knows that… Listen, just- Keep him alive, would you?’_

“Wouldn’t do anything _less_ , Hap’.”

_‘Okay, Tony. Bye.’_

“Bye.” The line clicks down. Tony puts his phone back in his pocket and waits, watching the thin slit of white light coming from beneath the door for any approaching shadows that might signal May’s approach.

“You hear that, kid? May’s here for you. She doesn’t know, don’t worry. I made up a cover story for you.”

What will he do when May arrives? Will he stay there? Peter deserves nothing less than all the support in the world, but Tony is… _Tony_. It’ll be a genuine surprise if May wants him to stay in the room once she arrives.

And arrive she does.

Tony hears the soft footfalls of flat shoes before he sees the shadow at the door, and then the handle is being turned, and-

May is, quite understandably, a mess. Her eyes are bloodshot still from crying, and despite the handkerchief in her hands there are still fresh tear marks on her face. Tony watches, upset, as her eyes widen upon seeing Peter, and a hushed series of words fall from her mouth. Tony stands, hands raised placatingly, and steps towards May.

“Mrs. Parker.” The words are woefully feeble, and certainly bring no comfort to her. Now, Tony may be a little inept with emotional situations, but he still guides May to his now-empty seat. She collapses into it. Weirdly enough, Tony understands the feeling. There is another chair on the other side of Peter’s bed, but he doesn’t really feel like he has cause to be so severely affected. After all, what’s _his_ panic when May could lose her only child?

The room is silent now, asides from machine beeps and hitched breaths. Tony chooses to remain silent. May is Peter’s last standing parental figure and is basically the kid’s mom; she deserves to have the time to get around the fact that her child is in a coma. God knows it’s taking Tony a hell of a lot of restraint to not express his distress, so he can only imagine how she feels.

After all, he doesn’t know how it feels to be a _parent_ losing a child, irregardless of how he feels about Peter.

(He only knows what it’s like to be a _child_ losing a parent.)

“What happened?” It’s a quiet, breathy and most certainly emotional whisper that breaches the silence, and Tony looks across. May is watching him, eyes studying his face carefully, both hands wrapped around one of Peter’s like some kind of safety blanket. She’s rubbing the motionless limb, but her gaze remains steady and constant. Suddenly, Tony feels a little bit naked.

“I’m sorry?”

And then he wants to slap himself. She asked an obvious question, and he, a renowned genius, didn’t understand. God.

“What happened to him? His hands are so _cold_.” Her voice grows teary as she speaks, and it’s then that Tony notices how she isn’t rubbing his hand but attempting to knead warmth back into Peter. That’s… that’s nothing short of tragic.

Tony blinks, looks down. Sighs. Massages wearily at his temples, and looks up to meet May’s eyes with a lie forming on his tongue.

“I- I don’t know for sure. I wasn’t there. I- There was a blip that FRIDAY sent through to me while I was in a meeting, and- I left to see what happened. They had Peter out by the time I got there.” It’s a good lie, for on-the-spot bullshittery. He’s glad it’s just May in the hospital room, because there’s noise, but not too much of it. It’s so much better than the silence. He does feel like he’s intruding though, watching May caressing Peter’s too-pale face with a motherly kind of gentleness. She brushes rogue brown locks out of Peter’s face, careful to avoid the tubes. Tony kind of wants to be a little closer to the kid, if only so he can hear the mechanical and forced rhythm of his breaths.

“If you want to get closer, Mr. Stark, just do it. Peter looks up to you; he won’t mind.” May doesn’t look up as she speaks, still seemingly entranced by her nephew’s peaceful expression, but her words carry all the weight of his thoughts nonetheless.

So Tony steps a little bit closer, opposite to May, and looks at Peter’s expression. Peaceful. Blank. _Wrong._ The Peter has known so far is lively and energetic, nothing like this empty shell he’s seeing now. Tony’s fingers twitch towards his palm, curling into weak fists and unclenching in a rhythmic pattern. He nearly takes Peter’s hand, but… he’s not the kid’s parent _or_ guardian. What right does he have?

“It’s fine, Stark. I’m pretty sure Peter would like it if he knew you were here for him right now.”

So Tony steps a little bit closer, and gently slips his hand under Peter’s. And recoils. His hand is colder than any human’s should be. But… he’s _helping,_ right? People always say touch can help patients recover from comas. Helen said contact could help. So maybe…

Perhaps more gently than before, Tony sinks into the chair. He’s deep within his own thoughts when he hears the first quiet, thick sniffle, and he looks to May in shock — she’s started to cry again. He’s quick to offer a tissue.

“I’m sorry. I don't usually- I just- I can’t lose Peter too. I can’t. This is all so overwhelming, and-” May dissolves into sniffles again, sleeves wiping harshly at her face. Tony leans over awkwardly and rests his hand on his shoulder, squeezing in a way he hopes comes across as comforting. He’s never been good with this type of thing.

“Mrs. Parker, it’s fine. I understand. Would you like me to leave?”

“No. Stay.” Tony’s eyebrows go up, but he doesn’t question her decision. Instead, he remains silent as she turns to her nephew again, eyes quickly filling with tears that seem almost eager to spill onto the sheets of Peter’s bed.

The small, poetic voice in the back of his head can’t help but draw his attention to how even May’s _tears_ are desperate to get closer to the kid.

“Oh, baby, what _happened…?”_ There aren’t words for how much Tony’s heart aches for this woman; this caring, strong woman who so clearly loves and cherishes her nephew, reduced to tears at his bedside. A hazy memory flashes through his head; a memory of a time long passed, where his own mom would rest at his bedside whenever he got sick and Howard was away. Slowly, carefully, Tony raises his elbow to rest on the arm of the chair and uses his sleeve to dab at the sudden moisture in his eyes.

He’s pretty sure May sees the motion for what it is anyways. But she doesn’t bring it up, so neither will he.

“I love you, Peter. More than anything else in the universe. I’m so, _so_ sorry I wasn’t here for you… _god,_ I’m sorry. Baby, I’m sorry.” And once again, it falls silent, leaving room only for thoughts in the disquieting and sobering emptiness of the room. For a few more minutes, Tony keeps himself, and to an extent, his _thoughts_ quiet; gives May the time she so dearly needs to learn and accept what’s happened. Hell, he still hasn’t quite dealt with it himself, so she’s already doing much better than he is. But at this point, Tony can tell that May _needs_ to let this out. He’ll be damned if he lets her internalise her guilt for this. Peter’s injuries aren’t _her_ fault, but he knows she’ll take the blame anyways.

Maybe it’s a Parker thing.

“It’s not your fault, y’know. If anything, it’s mine for not getting to him faster.” It feels somewhat better to take the blame. Maybe because that’s just how Tony is used to working. But he _means_ it.

“No, no, it’s just… It’s-“ A laugh; quiet and insincere, “It’s just a _little_ overwhelming.” That it is. So as May shudders and cries quietly, he mumbles what few reassurances he can think of, and generally just tries to be there as a support, even if they don’t know each other.

And from that moment on, it all starts to feel a little… _episodic,_ for lack of a better word. May will look up from where she stares at Peter’s hand, and she’ll mumble a quiet reassurance to him. Tony will count each heartbeat, each monotonous and obnoxious _beep_ as it rings out through the room. May will reach out, hand shaking slightly, to run a hand through Peter’s hair and flinch ever so slightly when he doesn’t respond.

Tony doesn’t even begin to question why she keeps trying, because he understands why she’s doing it. He keeps squeezing Peter’s hand, even when he knows nothing will happen. At some point in the weird, timeless haze, Happy messages him. Tony appreciates the distraction.

19:28

**Happy:** Did the kid’s Aunt get there safely?

**T.S:** She’s here.

19:31

**Happy:** Good. The kid?

**T.S:** Still under. No ETA on a wake up.

**Happy:** Shit. She okay?

19:32

**T.S:** She’s upset, understandably.

**Happy:** I’d be worried if she wasn’t.

 **Happy:** You are too.

19:33

**T.S:** Maybe.

The messages stop coming in after that, and Tony puts the phone down. Sometimes, it sucks to have someone know him so well. It means he can’t just distract them until they forget that he’s falling apart at the seams. He looks up, perhaps slightly sharply — May meets his gaze. Tony curses the unintended jerkiness of his action.

“You okay?” Her voice is soft but hoarse, and worn by tears.

“What?” He blinks, and shakes his head.

“Are _you_ okay?”

“Yeah, _I’m_ fine. I should be asking _you_ that. Do you need anything? Want anything?” He asks, and May pauses, apparently deep in thought.

“When are the visiting hours for tomorrow?”

Tony blinks. Maybe slightly foolishly, he hadn’t anticipated that question. But still, even if he doesn’t know the hours himself…

“FRI?” He queries. Tony knows his girl is smart enough to know what he’s asking for.

_‘Visiting hours are from 9:00 to 13:00, then a restriction while the patient rests, and then from 15:00 until 21:00.’_

Tony nods, swallowing the information. That’s good to know. “Thanks, FRI.” May looks at him with a distantly thankful look in her eyes, buried below the tears and redness.

“I’m sorry.” May looks up sharply, a confused and perhaps incredulous look in her eyes.

“For _what?”_ Her voice is still thick with tears, but there’s a slightly perplexed undertone — Tony understands that, too. _He_ doesn’t know why he’s apologising. It doesn’t make sense, nor does it follow any kind of logic that Tony is so fond of, but-

He apologises anyways. Apologies, apologising, that’s all he ever does, isn’t it? Afghanistan, his bombs- apologise. The Expo clusterfuck- apologise. Extremis. Ultron- apologise.

_This._ There’s nothing he could have done to prevent it, really, because kids are fucking stupid and they don’t like to listen to information that could save their lives, and Tony couldn’t have done anything but they’re here, now, with a comatose Peter and suddenly apologising feels like the _least_ he can do. To bring some kind of reassurance or comfort to the kid’s aunt who could very nearly have stopped being _Aunt_ May and started being just May Parker. He’s been focusing so intently on his feelings that he forgot that fact — that the woman sat just next to him could have lost her last living family member; her last connection to her dead husband and her dead brother and sister in-law and she would have been alone for the rest of her life.

Selfish, selfish, selfish. Thinking about himself, only himself, and-

He breathes out quietly, the noise shuddering and slightly wheezing.

Peter’s blood- that’s on his hands. Apologise, apologise, apologise. More blood on his hands but it feels heavier than before and it’s probably because this time he _knows_ the person whose life he’s ruined just by being there.

Just a kid. Just a _kid,_ not even an adult yet, just a teenager who really wants to help and now this has happened to him just for wanting to _help-_

Just like he did, before the money and power got to his head. Back when Obie hadn’t exposed himself as a total ass-eating dickbag, and he hadn’t quite discovered women yet and generally just wanted to follow in Howard’s footsteps because _that was what he was born to do, right,_ he just wanted to put an end to all the fighting by building something that could end it all in one fell swoop.

Some good that did.

So maybe he’s apologising because he sees way too much of himself in Peter. Apologising because this happened. This is Peter’s Afghanistan, his arc reactor. This is the traumatic event that could shape him, and Tony brought it on while he is still a kid.

Ah. He’s apologising so Peter doesn’t turn out just like him. Fractured.

Broken.

He shrugs. “I’m just… sorry.”

That’s all he can really do to try and fix this not-quite-mistake-on-his-behalf-but-still-feels-like-one that seems to be weighing down so heavily on his heart.

Tony sucks in a breath; looks around. The dimming light coming in through the curtains suddenly seem too much, slits of sharp white through death-white hospital decour, bouncing off of untarnished tiles on the floor and oh god, this entire goddamn thing has been a disaster from start to finish and he really, really should never have gotten involved-

Anxiety attack on his six o’clock.

Tony tries to take a deeper breath, against that hollow and painful ache in his sternum where the arc reactor once was that occasionally flares up with phantom pains when he’s _particularly_ stressed, and is this why new parents are always so nervous sweet jesus-

Mentor. It’s only been a few days and _this_ has happened, Tony doesn’t deserve the right to put himself in any role other than mentor. Jesus fucking christ, he can’t screw anyone up anymore than he already has. Poison. That’s what he is, he’s a poison, a slow-moving _poison_ that is already destined to royally screw everything up more than humanly possible.

“That doesn’t answer my question.” May’s tone has gotten softer, more quiet.

“I know.” There’s something heavy that slips out alongside his words, and he imagines it would be black and slimy and toxic and-

Guilt.

Yeah, it’s guilt.

“FRIDAY, status.” He ignores the static pricking of anxiety in his chest as May looks at him weirdly, and instead tries to favour FRIDAY’s smooth voice as she rattles off random statistics to him.

_‘...time is 20:16 in New York, weather prediction being mostly overcast for the next few hours. You are currently in the upstate New York Avengers compound…’_

It… it’s been hours since Peter first came in. At least seven by now. Tony and May have been there for about an hour and a half.

So he was in surgery for about, what, five and a half hours? Six hours?

He rests his head in his hands.

“This isn’t your fault, you know. I don’t think Peter would want you to blame yourself- _god,_ that makes it sound like he’s- he’s…” May trails off, voice suddenly hollow. Tony flinches slightly at the implication of what she’d said before he hears her suck in a breath through gritted teeth.

“He’s alive. Just- just sleeping it off. Let’s just think of it like that, just so we don’t lose our minds.” The determination in her voice is unmistakable. Tony looks up; meets her eyes.

They’re hurt. There’s a whole universe of pain and agonized thoughts there, but there’s determination hidden beneath the surface. And despite how Peter’s lying next to him, surrounded by softly beeping machinery and the mechanical puffs of breath the ventilator is giving him, Tony feels slightly less burdened.

Only slightly, though.

This whole thing- it’s on him. _Mostly_ on him. And the thought of Peter not waking up, or missing out on even a day of his life as a result of this disaster… put lightly, it’s distressing. Put as it is, it makes Tony feel sick.

It’s quiet in the room now.

Tony doesn’t dare speak. The silence carries everything that’s going unsaid right now, and despite how it’s crushing his chest (like it does when he keeps everything pent up — Howard, Obadiah, Vanko, New York, Extremis, Ultron, _Steve_ ), he knows that May needs it. She needs to think. She needs the peace, because her life is lacking it right now.

He stays quiet.

The silence lasts hours. Occasionally, he’ll share a pained look with May _(what right does he have to be sad, Peter isn’t his nephew or his family, Peter’s just a kid whose life he made worse by being in it),_ and they’ll look away after exchanging a non-verbal declaration of an apology and an acceptance. It’s gotten late — he can feel his eyes burning every time he blinks. May isn’t faring much better, either. Her eyes, while still nothing short of heartsick, are drooping as well. Tony inhales deeply.

“Visiting time’s nearly over. I can give you a room here if you want it.” His voice is soft, and he hates how he can hear it wavering occasionally. He’s not used to being so unsure, and he is _not_ used to these sorts of things being so… emotionally debilitating to him.

He’s not used to Peter Parker, or how the kid’s gotten so far under his skin.

(Maybe it’s because he and the kid could have been one and the same, if a few things were changed.)

“No.”

“What?”

“I- I have to get back to the apartment-” He notices how she doesn’t call it _home_ anymore- “I have to tell work I need to take a leave. Oh god, I have to tell Ned. And his school.” Her voice turns thick again. Tony understands — well, not really — that she must be under _so much stress_ right now. She’s got to tell the kid’s friends, his school, her work… there’s no way for her to try and get the fact that _her nephew is in a coma_ off her mind.

“I’m so sorry. If you want, I could tell his school.” May looks up at him, eyes wide. He’s suddenly much more conscious of what he’s just offered to do — make his involvement in the kid’s life more prominent, claim some responsibility for what happened (like he should)... It doesn’t seem like a good idea. Some part of him doesn’t want to drag the kid into that publicity shitstorm, while the rest of him just wants Peter to wake up.

_God,_ he wants the kid to wake up.

“No, I can do it. I _should_ do it. Those are just- they’re technicalities, I just- I wanna get everything done so I can be here. I can’t do that without going back.” Tony has to commend her for being so brave. He knows he’s hardly going to leave Peter’s side until the kid wakes up _(if),_ regardless of whatever projects he’s got going on or anything else.

“Maybe I can get some of the things he likes- for when he wakes up. Could bring them up here for him…”

Tony gives a small smile, but it feels forced and unnatural. “Yeah. That’d be good.”

He’s pretty sure that this is May’s way of coping — helping others, or trying to rectify the situation however she can. It’s immediately a better method than Tony’s usual path of self-destruction. But it’s immensely saddening to see.

He looks back at Peter, remorse leaden in his lungs. Damn kid’s so small, he could look younger than he already is (Tony ignores how it pushes every protective button in his chest, how he wants to smooth down the curls he didn’t even realise the kid had until now, if only to alleviate the guilt crushing him). And _May._ God, May. Tony couldn’t even begin to understand how much it’s going to hurt her to have to tell anyone in the kid’s life that he’s currently in a coma.

There’s something to be said about the despondent aura of the room. Peter, comatose. May, teetering on the knife’s edge that is grief. Whatever despairing sensation has crawled into his heart is tamped down quickly. He’s just the guy that dragged the kid into this life under the guise of a responsible mentor (he’s failed _that),_ he doesn’t have the right to be so upset.

But he is.

He sighs, heart heavy. Guilt is such a terrible thing, even if he deserves it.

His phone vibrates in his pocket. Tony grabs it, looks at the notification:

21:00

**FRIDAY:** _Visiting hours are now over for the day, boss._

**FRIDAY:** _Helen is giving you both a few more minutes, but she would like for you to know that you both need to take care of yourselves._

**FRIDAY:** _She says to not worry about him. The chances that Mr. Parker’s health will decline are incredibly slim._

**FRIDAY:** _You need to rest._

May is still leaning over Peter, and his heart breaks anew for her. But they need to leave to allow the kid some time to rest and heal. Instead of breaking the silence and speaking to FRIDAY like he normally would, he just replies:

21:01

**T.S:** Thanks, FRI.

**T.S:** Can you bring Happy around for the kid’s aunt?

**FRIDAY:** No problem.

“May?”

“Visiting time…?” Her tone poses it as a question, one to which Tony slowly nods to in response. Her eyes turn downcast as she stares down at Peter.

He’s so _pale_. Tony stands, perhaps a little too abruptly to be considered normal, and fiddles with his hands, picking at his nails. It stings, but it’s a distraction, so… Tony looks down and his feet to suck in a quiet breath. He looks up.

“There’s still a room up here for you, if you want it.”

“I’ll take it tomorrow. I have to get our things from the apartment.”

See, that’s the thing. He _knows_ from experience that going somewhere that’s important to someone you love, when they’re hurt or dead… he knows the emptiness of that place is always going to be haunting. He doesn’t want May going back because he’s been in an empty, lifeless room, because nobody should ever have to feel that pain.

So he watches as May stands. Her eyes are vacant behind the tears. She’s still holding Peter’s pale, motionless hand. Tony hadn’t quite noticed how white-tinged-blue the kid’s nail beds still are. Like there’s no blood there at all.

“I’ll be back soon, baby, I swear. I’m not leaving you. I’m gonna be here for you the whole time, you hear me…? I couldn’t be there before, and I’m- I’m _never_ doing that again. I promise. I promise…” May presses a light kiss to the kid’s forehead, shifting curls out of the way to do so. Peter’s expression doesn’t even shift — still locked in his coma, muscles relaxed. Peaceful. But the contrast of black-ringed, gaunt eye sockets against almost papery white skin, cracked lips, eyelashes dusting the kid’s cheeks-

Like a goddamn nightmare fresh out of a horror show.

(He’s never noticed the slight speckling of freckles on the kid’s face.)

Tony closes his eyes; looks away briefly. He can hear each shuddering intake of breath May breathes. His almost mirror hers.

“R-right. Let’s just- I’ll be back soon, baby.” She mumbles, and then, to Tony, “Let’s just- go now. Before I change my mind.”

Tony can see it etched onto her face, the deep frown lines, sorrow around her eyes, that her resolve is fragmenting already. So he casts one more look over Peter, then takes steps on numb legs out of the room.

It’s late. It hits him once he’s clear of the boundaries, the ageless grief, just how long it’s been since the morning. Each second has been a small eternity. Walking with May through these halls… they’re both silent. Digesting the day’s events. Tony regrets that he can’t engage her in any conversation, but it hardly seems appropriate right now. And he’d probably do something stupid — he’s never been the most rational with grief.

The walk is hushed, and not in a tranquil way. It’s the quiet he associates with death and loss and mourning. Tony hates it.

He also hates that he can’t do much more than offer mumbled condolences at May before she gets in the car. She looks thankful — as thankful as someone with a comatose child can be, anyway. Happy meets his eyes for a second, the gaze conveying sadness and the quiet backbone he’s always had in his friend when he’s been grieving. Tony tries to make his lips quirk up in a not-quite-smile, but it doesn’t work. He suspects it comes out as more of a grimace.

The wind is bitter. Tony looks up, to where stars dot the skies in constellations whose names are right on the tip of his tongue. He remembers being a kid, nestled up close to his Mom’s side as she combed her fingers through his hair, listening to the delicate, ornate names roll off her tongue as he would stare up in awe at the vast expanse of space. Tony remembers being desperate to reach those beautiful beacons in the sky. He remembers Mom teaching him Italian while they stargazed. The dark used to be more calming then, like a blanket instead of a tomb.

He’s seen space, now. It’s not beautiful, it’s ravenous, it takes everything and empties it and takes its time to leech the life from things. He’d been a particularly naive kid.

Tony shivers. The bright lights of the compound are painful on his eyes, now they’ve adjusted to the serenity of the outside. Distantly, he can hear the soft susurration of the wind through trees, and thrumming cars further away. Tony closes his eyes, takes in the quiet, lets it fill his chest.

He walks back into the compound. The look he’s going for is _suave,_ but he’s relatively certain it looks more like a _help me_ sort of thing. Nobody is about this late, though.

He’s got things to do before he goes to sleep. Tony needs to get the suit back from Helen, for one. For two, he’s gonna-

He’s gonna just make sure Peter’s okay for the night. He’s on autopilot on the way back to medical. He ignores how his eyelids are pulling themselves down, and hovers in the doorway.

For his effort, Tony is rewarded with a sharp stab of pain in his chest — Peter looks like an even younger child with nobody at his side anymore. He wants to stay. He really does. He wants to keep himself around so he can help Peter if anything goes wrong, but more importantly, he wants to make sure he doesn’t have to be alone through this.

Tony looks around, back into the hallways, to make sure nobody is about to see. He sharply walks towards Peter’s bed, but his arms are nothing short of tender when he pulls the blanket covering the kid up a little higher to keep him warm. He doesn’t know how warm or cold the kid is right now — but he’d rather err on the side of caution. He’s screwed this up enough. He has to _try_ to get started on making up for his failure. Tony smooths down an errant curl on Peter’s head.

“Get better soon, kid. We’ll wait for you.”

And ain’t that just the truth?

When he walks out of Peter’s hospital room, the weight of the world is more than content to flatten him again. Tony lets the door close quietly before slumps against the wall, sighing. Now that the guilt has receded (for now) and the panic has died off, all that’s left in his chest is a cavity. A vacuum. Tony feels empty, and he can’t even hate it. So he lets his head fall, chin briefly touching his chest, eyes fluttering closed. Tony gives the hair at the back of his head a brief tug before they trail to his temple, pressuring the spot where the building-migraine has decided to take residence.

He feels so _old._ Drained.

With what feels like the force of lifting a building, Tony forces himself to stand upright again. His hand rests against the door.

_In, out._

Tony turns around. The hallways beckon him, but he’s got something to do first.

“FRI, where’s Helen?”

_‘In her office. I’ll tell her you’re coming.’_

Tony smiles. It rings hollow. “Thanks, baby girl.”

His footsteps echo in the silence, bouncing from wall to wall in an endless cacophony of white noise. Doors and the would-be front desk of the hospital reception pass him as he trudges through winding corridors. The tips of his fingers grow cold as he drags them along the smoothly painted walls. It’s leeching all the warmth from his core, but he can’t find it in himself to stop.

Tony blinks when Helen’s door is in front of him. He hadn’t done so in a while, he realises. Zoned out, then. He pushes the door open, and curses how the well-cared for hinges remain silent. He needs noise, something to take him out of this sensory deprivation.

“Tony.” She’s already stood from her seat — right, FRIDAY said she’d notify her in advance. She looks just as exhausted as he does, looking over papers and what he thinks could be results from some kind of scan or test. Tony rubs his hands together.

“Helen.”

“Are you okay? How was his Aunt?” Her voice is so gentle that it’s musical to his ears, tone rising and falling steadily. There’s sorrow in there, though. It permeates everything.

“The kid’s aunt… she’s upset. Really upset. Rightfully so, I mean, her kid’s- he’s in a coma. But… she’s gone back home for the night. Said she was gonna grab some of the kid’s stuff for him, make arrangements while he recovers. I fully intend on letting her stay up here while he heals. They’re all the family they have left. I wouldn’t even try to separate them.” He fidgets the whole time he’s speaking. He’s restless.

“That’s good. She’s smart.”

“Yeah. And I can’t even think past right now… I’m just- ugh.”

“You didn’t answer my first question, Tony.” Helen’s hand lands on his shoulder, and Tony looks up to meet her eyes.

“I’m not okay. Dragged the kid in to help bring in Cap, now he’s in a coma because I didn’t return the favour of being there to help him. I’m doing a pretty bad job at being a _responsible mentor.”_

“But you _did_ help him. If you didn’t care, you wouldn’t have called the FBI in to take the Vulture in. If you didn’t care, you would have left the kid to take that on alone. Yes, the situation he’s in is unfavourable, put nicely. It’s better than the alternative. So don’t blame yourself for doing what you _could,_ Tony. It won’t do anything to help him now.”

Tony stays silent. He’s not sure if he believes that himself. He’s overall just a negative influence in most people’s lives, or people negatively influence his. There’s very few people he knows he can’t mess up now — if only because they’re still with him now.

That’s… that’s actually kind of sad to think about. It’s probably time to change the subject.

“Did you get his suit?” Tony prays that it’s in-tact. It could be one of the only ways he can hunt the Vulture down, and while he won’t hold it against Helen if it got damaged, he just _hopes_ that it’s not irreparably screwed. Helen hands him a white, clinical looking package from her desk (he hadn’t even noticed it was there). It’s yielding under his grip, almost soft, and he knows it’s the suit.

“It’s a good job it has that quick removal function. We would have had to cut it away otherwise.”

Tony almost lets out a relieved sigh. He doesn’t. His fingers bump into a more solid object in the package, and he frowns.

“His phone…?”

“No idea how he managed to keep hold of that.”

“There’s- There’s slots where extra web cartridges can go, on his suit. It _could_ hold a phone- hell, the ones towards the back are basically pockets. Didn’t think he’d use them like that, but…” Tony holds the package like he’s scared it’ll just fall away like sand between his fingers.

“He’ll be fine, Tony. He’s got a healing factor, remember? Sure, it might take a while for him to be at 100% again, but… you don’t need to worry so much.” Tony blinks. He’d forgotten about the healing factor, too. He tries to smother down the flickering of hope in his chest, because he doesn’t really want to get his hopes up. It’s not very effective. He focuses up again when Helen shuffles, almost awkwardly, looking chagrined. “That must sound so insensitive, I’m sorry.”

“No- Helen, it’s fine. It’ll get through my skull one day. Until then, you and Pepper and Rhodey and Happy can keep telling me.”

He can’t conceal the yawn that nearly pops his jaw. Tony knows his eyes are wide as he covers his mouth, and Helen is smiling in that way that’s nearly a giggle, but she’s too in the zone to really break her professionalism. Or exhausted. What’s the difference?

“I’ll let you go, Tony. Try to get some some sleep, please.”

Tony averts his eyes, but commits it to memory. He should at least try.

He knows he’ll be greeted by some fairly gruesome nightmares tonight, and they’re all gonna have something to do with his resident, comatose spiderling. There’s no point in trying.

“Thank you, Helen. For saving his life, for just… thank you.” He says in a rushed exhale. When he’s drawn into what could be labelled a hug, he doesn’t fight it. His brain probably needs the contact before touch-starvation settles in and exacerbates everything.

“Now go get some sleep, Tony.” He’s basically swept out of the room, package still in his arms.

Tony shakes his head slightly. His feet follow muscle memory as he moves through the halls, lone footsteps birthing the unholy dissonance that’s been following him for what seems to have been forever. Or at least since this morning. They feel about the same by now. Tony knows Pepper is doing her thing still, someplace across the world with a name that’s beyond his exhausted memory, and he’ll be going back to an empty bedroom tonight. Just what he needs — more PTSD with no-one to help remedy it when he will undoubtedly wake up within about two hours, terrified.

Suddenly, sleep seems like an insurmountable challenge that he’ll have to take on anyway.

Tony’s only just at the foyer when his phone buzzes in his pocket. He frowns, but drags it out his pocket.

21:57

**FRIDAY:** Spider-Man suit offline. Beginning AI integration.

Tony blinks. He had forgotten about that. The plan was that if the kid and the suit ever wound up at the compound and the suit was offline, the AI inside it would be able to escape to an online system and interact with FRIDAY. That had been assuming Peter would go through the correct routes of unlocking the suit’s features, but… it is what it is. So the kid’s AI is connecting to the mainframe of the compound. That’s good, it means when he takes the suit into the labs tomorrow, he’ll have one less thing to do to be able to access the files he needs in the Baby Monitor Protocol.

22:00

**FRIDAY:** Successful AI reintegration of: Karen, to: upstate Avengers compound, New York.

**Karen:** Good evening, Mr. Stark.

“Karen, huh…” Tony is hit with an urge to laugh. _Karen._ Peter called his very intelligent AI _Karen._ It’s a very _Peter_ thing to do. The urge to laugh is amplified by fondness, then snuffed out by guilt.

So much for responsible mentor.

It’s too late to be dealing with his guilt complex. Tony rubs his sore eyes, and nearly falls into his bedroom. It’s a little lonely without Pepper, but she’s doing other important things. He’ll deal. Tony rests the neat package with Peter’s suit in it on one of the chairs in the plush, cushty living area. It stands out from the rest of his room. He doesn’t like it.

Even when he slips into more comfortable, worn clothes he’d usually wear in the labs and under his comforter, he can’t help but think of the abandoned package and the comatose kid who’d been babbling in awe over it only a few days ago.

That’s a whole lot of change in just a few days.

All those worst case scenarios he designed that suit to protect Peter against, and this has happened anyway. Didn’t think hard enough about how to keep the kid safe. He’s not cut out for this _mentor_ thing, is he…?

Agitated, Tony rolls over and shoves his hand under the pillow where it’s cooler.

_C’mon, just go to sleep. Deep breaths. Even breaths. Get comfortable. Sleep._

He’s getting desperate now, shifting position every few minutes in the endless pursuit of comfort that only grows longer when he’s hurt or anxious.

_Relieve all pressure on limbs…? Get more comfy, it’s just a bed. Listen to your breathing. Slow, even breathing. Follow it._

_Even._

_Slow._

_Slow..._

He’s not even aware of when his brain finally seems to turn off with the whole _thinking_ thing, it just… happens. His head stays empty.

He’s always known that time goes funny in his sleep. In fact, he’s spent enough time semi-conscious when dreaming that he’s just managed to retain some kind of awareness while he sleeps. He remembers Pepper calling it ‘eclectic’ with her fond smile; he remembers Rhodey calling it weird when he bounced back part of an overheard conversation at him. Awareness has always been a sleep problem, though — Tony always rests lightly, just in case.

In fact…

He’s walking. Through the compound, alone. It’s silent. He looks around into the endless corridors, weaving hallways and hidden passages, but nobody’s around. He feels cold, though, and damp, like he’s been stood out in the rain for too long.

His hands and arms feel heavy as if he’s carrying something, some invisible weight that’s attached to his body. He looks down.

His hands are dyed the deepest red he can imagine. It’s staining under his nails, in his callouses, decorating the lines of his skin and painting him red. It’s cold, and sticky. Tony lifts it to his face; hesitantly, he brings two fingers together and pulls them apart.

The blood trail stretches between his thumb and index finger before the burden on both sides grows too much, and the droplet in the middle of the blood-thread drops down into the crimson puddles in his palms, immediately lost-

_blood on his hands-_

Tony’s bolt upright the second he wakes up, chest heaving violently and hands trembling like he’s having a seizure. It’s so dark, too dark, and all he can see is that little blood droplet falling away from the two threads keeping it suspended, falling away, _dying-_

He doesn’t understand. He doesn’t _understand_ what’s happening to Peter, he doesn’t understand how the kid’s gonna be right now. He doesn’t get what’s going to happen. It’s too uncertain, there are too many unknowns for him to be comfortable anymore.

“FRIDAY?”

_‘Boss? You should be asleep.’_

“I know, I know, it’s just- I- can you help me?”

_‘Always. What do you need?’_

Tony’s hands still tremble, clenching the comforter like a lifeline while his heart pounds away in his chest, so hard it might shatter his artificial sternum. It must be about to, how _hard_ can someone’s heart pump blood before accidentally breaking something?

He looks up to the ceiling, so many questions on his tongue that he might as well be a philosopher.

“I need you to open a notes tab, and I need you to help me learn.”

_‘About what, boss?’_

Tony sucks in a breath, heart heavy and stomach resting uncomfortably in his throat. The air is too thin, even as he keeps breathing it in.

He doesn’t really sleep well that night, and if he spends more than a few hours reading up about oxygen starvation, comas and hypovolemic shock, that’s nobody’s business but his.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> find me on tungler at spiderboyneedsahug for some occasional screaming about how this fic has my entire ass and soul
> 
> and scream @ me in the comments pls it gives me life


	3. The Incident, part 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another flash of red catches her eyes, and a colour that may be blue hidden away underneath it. It’s weird, because Peter only owns one red jumper. Maybe it’s one of Ned’s? She recognises the warm way they look at each other; it’s not completely inconceivable to think Ned’s given Peter a hoodie, or maybe he just left it there by accident. Either way, May huffs a laugh, and pulls the jumper out. It feels different in her grip, for sure; more worn. There’s a black smudge on it, too, and she can’t help but worry about how it got there — was he in danger beforehand?
> 
> May turns the hoodie so the front faces upwards and flattens it out.
> 
> She sucks in a breath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> literal disaster coming through with a whole ass chapter, y e e t

When May gets back to the apartment complex, it’s dark out. Stars pepper the sky before she walks in (alone), a heated gust of air rushing to greet her. She remembers Peter making a comment about how his hands were freezing in a time long gone by, and then being delighted at the warmth as it met him. May’s gaze creeps down to her side, where Peter would be.

And, as all logic dictates, the space is empty.

May sighs, but the emotion on her chest doesn’t relent. Tears prickle at her eyes. As she walks towards their (her) apartment, the space that is normally occupied by Peter’s mindless rambling is sorely missed. The silence is piercing. She elbows open the door, coat draped over her arm, and the resultant crash on the wall rings out in the shadowed room.

She’s shattered. Both in terms of exhaustion, and in the way her chest feels like glass shards, stabbing further into her lungs and heart with every breath she takes.

Normally, she’d hear Peter clattering about in his room, knocking things over and hastily yelling things about the place. The whole place just seemed so much more lively in her memories, and now she’s alone, the darkness appears to bleed out of the corners, seeping into the room and poisoning it. There’s no warmth, not anymore. Right now, her warmth is in upstate New York, in a hospital bed, with machines keeping him alive and alone.

She stifles a sob.

_Peter…_

May could be dying, for all the pain in her chest. Just _thinking_ about Peter, by himself and hurt, is enough to force more tears down her cheeks. They’re warm, but not the warm she wants.

She just wants to hug her baby; cradle him and keep him safe from the world. Running her hands through Peter’s curls earlier… it’s not the same. He was so _cold._ The Peter she loves is always so warm and energetic and bouncy and happy, and to see him looking so dead- she doesn’t want to see it, ever again, but she knows she can’t just leave her baby up there alone.

On a different note, she’d been almost curious to note Tony’s behaviour in the hospital room. May’s seen the news reports and she’s been alive long enough to know of pre-Iron Man Tony Stark, she knows openly being affected by something has never been his ‘thing’. But he hadn’t just been affected, he’d been _emotional._ May didn’t miss how he’d been trying to make her comfortable; how he’d been sneaking looks at Peter’s monitors, and how _sad_ his eyes were.

It’s actually difficult to reconcile the Tony Stark she’s seen on the media to the Tony Stark she’s seen today. He wasn’t loud or obnoxious, he’d been reserved and softly spoken. He hadn’t been exuberant and self-centered, he’d been sorrowful and unendingly worried about _her_ comfort.

On some level, she wouldn’t be surprised if Peter has managed to worm under Stark’s skin already. He’s always had a way of making people care.

May flicks on a light, illuminating the room and banishing the darkness. The room still seems gloomy.

It’s like it was after Ben.

A room full of furniture and technically, all the hallmarks of life, feeling empty and lonely. It’s void of life, and May realises with renewed hatred just how much she despises the silence.

A too-big bed after a gunshot. A house full of packed boxes lacking a place to tuck them away into (it makes it final). A living room full of blankets and cushions, and a broken, gaping hole in the family that can’t be filled.

An empty bedroom.

She didn’t even realise she’d been walking towards it until now. May blinks the tears out of her eyes. The room is empty of life, but full of Peter’s things. His school equipment is hastily strewn over his desk, a hoodie over a chair, a disheveled comforter on an unmade bed.

It had just been so _abrupt._ No warning or heads up, just… sending Peter off to school in the morning, and then-

This.

Her hands itch to do something. Neaten up crooked blankets, cook something new. Hold Peter close. Ruffle his hair.

There’s nobody to cook for, and May knows she won’t be able to stomach anything right now. So she just walks into Peter’s bedroom, feels the hollow silence; collapses into Peter’s chair.

In her mind’s eye, she can almost see Peter moving about the room with his usual frantic energy. When she opens them, the warm light is gone and so is Peter.

May kneads at her temple, and just takes a few minutes to breathe raggedly, trying to hold back tears, because she can’t lose Peter too. She lost Mary and Richard when Peter was a kid, then they lost Ben, and now Peter’s on a ledge, wobbling.

She can’t lose anyone else.

Slowly, she stands, and she starts filtering through all the _junk_ on Peter’s floor. There’s so much of it, and it makes fondness run through her chest — it’s cold, though, not warm like normal.

She wants to bring something reassuring up to the compound tomorrow. She doesn’t know much about comas. But she _does_ know that familiar things might comfort Peter, and that _might_ is good enough.

The first thing she sees is a red jumper poking out from underneath his bed. May’s heart warms in a way that’s heavy with grief as she grabs the sleeve and pulls it out into full view. The jumper is one of Ben’s. She remembers the day Peter took it, eyes bloodshot and full of tears, and slipped it over his too-skinny frame. He’s worn it whenever he needs comforting. May thumbs at the material gently, treasuring the softness in her hands. It’s fleeced. No wonder Peter wears it so much — he’s too skinny to keep himself warm, always has been, even though it’s been worse recently. She sees a white wire flashing out of the pocket of the hoodie and tugs it out.

Peter’s headphones. He’ll want them with him. May folds the sweater and rests the headphones on top of it before putting them to one side and gently settling onto her knees for anything else that Peter might want for when (not if, _when)_ he wakes up. Peter doesn’t really have very much, though. He’s got some oversized shirts lying around, school equipment dotted around the place, but nothing much of huge value.

Another flash of red catches her eyes, and a colour that may be blue hidden away underneath it. It’s weird, because Peter only owns one red jumper. Maybe it’s one of Ned’s? She recognises the warm way they look at each other; it’s not completely inconceivable to think Ned’s given Peter a hoodie, or maybe he just left it there by accident. Either way, May huffs a laugh, and pulls the jumper out. It feels different in her grip, for sure; more worn. There’s a black smudge on it, too, and she can’t help but worry about how it got there — was he in danger beforehand?

May turns the hoodie so the front faces upwards and flattens it out.

She sucks in a breath.

The smudge, albeit a little crude, could be interpreted to be a _drawing._ The mark on the center of the hoodie isn’t dirt or ash, it’s an emblem in the almost unmistakable shape of a _spider._

Ice leaks into her heart, spreading fast through her body with her blood.

It’s the same emblem on the chest of the spider guy who goes around protecting… Queens…

“Oh my god.”

She doesn’t dare to even touch the jumper, for fear that it’s actually there and tangible, and the weirdness of Peter’s recent behaviour will suddenly come together into a picture that May really, really doesn’t want to see.

_Peter is Spider-Man._

Her nephew- her _baby_ is the night-time vigilante who’s been taking down crimes at night. He’s the one who popped up to fight the simplest crimes.

May gasps and shoots upright, yanking her hand back from the hoodie as if burned. Her eyes are burning, but her chest is cold and breathing in has become difficult, like what she could imagine inhaling water to feel like. Her lungs just _can’t_ function with so much stress piling onto her.

May takes one more look at the hoodie to reaffirm it’s still there and not a product of her grief — _it won’t go away_ — before storming out of the bedroom. She doesn’t know where she’s going, no plan in mind, but she can’t stay in the same room as _that._

A lot of things are beginning to make sense now, piecing themselves together in her head. All those nights where Peter came home from ‘studying’ beyond exhausted, hardly even able to keep himself upright — from fighting criminals; catching cars. The bruises she thought had been a result of that Flash kid picking on her baby — from stopping armed robberies and getting thrown through walls. The broken glasses and slightly warped doorknob of Peter’s room. The absence. The silent determination wired into how he holds himself, the faintly calculating look in his eyes when he’d look at buildings at they walked down the streets. So many of the confusing peculiarities that had just sprung up into Peter’s personality… He’d been living a complete different life when nobody was looking.

May isn’t sure what the churning feeling of sickness coiling in her gut is. Is it her anger at Peter for lying to her, or her anger at herself for not noticing sooner?

May nearly jogs aimlessly through the apartment, suddenly too restless to stay still. It’s the itch in her veins as her heart pumps her blood around her body, spreading the ice-hot anger through her. There are tears in her eyes, and she can imagine her face is splotchy-red right now, but she doesn’t allow herself to stop — it’s the only way she can burn off all this ungovernable energy in her. May runs a frustrated hand through her hair, smooths it back down. It’s knotty. She’s a frenzied mess, both inside and out, and the reflection of her thoughts on herself is fitting.

And yeah, thoughts of Peter, alone and hurt upstate, slip into her internal rant to flash-freeze her insides, but-

_Stark._

Did he know…?

May looks into the living room, where the landline is, and considers briefly. Her face is slack, eyes puffy from crying, tears still caressing her cheeks, hands paused in their attempts to cradle her temple and contain the ache that’s building there. Right there, that phone-

A clipped memory flashes into her head. A sticky note, stuck to the side of Peter’s bed, with a hastily scrawled but still legible phone number on it. Not Peter’s own writing, no- It’s too neat to be Peter’s. It was obviously written by a practised hand. May walks into Peter’s room, outstretched hand brushing against the walls as she goes. The note is still there. So she crouches down to stare it, observes the number until she’s certain it’s been committed to memory.

It flutters lightly as she rushes out of the room.

(She wouldn’t dare to disturb it.)

May punches the number into the phone and waits impatiently for it to pick up, foot rhymically tapping the floor. The line clicks. She hasn’t prepared for this, she doesn’t know what to say, how to phrase it, what does can she do _ohgod-_

May doesn’t wait for Stark to speak after picking up.

“Did you know?” She’s breathless from her rage (and the pacing), and her voice nearly comes across as a growl. Part of her hates the sound, and instinctively wants to apologise for it, but- the rest of her is angry. So, so angry. This… Peter could have _died_ long before this incident, and Stark’s involvement could make it so much worse. Her baby is in so much danger, all the time, and she hasn’t known. And he has.

“About…?” He sounds really tired as well, as beaten down as she is, and she almost feels sorry for waking him up before the reality of the situation slams into her again, and she grits her teeth.

“Don’t fuck with me, Stark! Did you know?!” A deep breath comes in over the phone, slow and unsteady. May can almost imagine Stark dragging a hand down his face, exhausted too.

“About Peter being…?”

Her chest turns cold.

“You did.” He knew. He’s known, the whole time. He’s known that Peter is who he is, and- she wasn’t told. Neither of them told her. She’s Peter’s _family-_ if he can’t tell her, why did he tell Stark…?

The rational part of her wants to believe Stark figured it out on his own — the man’s a world renowned genius, it’s more than probable that he did. But _she didn’t know._ Peter’s been acting weird for a while now, and she _didn’t notice._

She can’t tell who she’s mad at anymore — Stark, Peter, or herself.

“I- I can’t believe this. I can’t believe you. He got hurt- there was no accident, there was _nothing-_ it was the goddamn ferry, and- oh my god, did you put him up to this?”

The response she gets to the question, the almost condemning question, is what surprises her.

“No, I wouldn’t. I told him to leave it, he didn’t, I would _never_ make a kid do _anything_ like that.” Stark’s voice is so vehement and suddenly adamant that it throws her off guard. That level of emotion can’t be faked, not even by him.

“If I’d known I would have stopped him before _that_ happened.” Once resolute but now turning feeble, he gains a tone that’s almost desperate as he talks to her. She can tell he’s really trying to convey his feelings, and he genuinely didn’t want Peter involved. This time, she _does_ feel sympathy. It gets smothered pretty quickly by hurt again, but it’s an improvement.

She never has been able to be angry at things when Peter’s involved — not for long anyway. Doesn’t mean she’s not angry right now, at Peter _and_ Stark. And herself.

“You brought him into this.” It’s not a question. It feels like an accusation on her tongue, barbed and slick with poison.

“May…”

“The spider-guy has been around longer than your ‘internship’. Why’d you bring him in?”

She has _so_ many questions. They’re not all nice ones, either. Peter was doing this long before Stark popped up, she’d seen the news reports, and she’ll talk to him about that as soon as she can, but-

“He was Spider-Man before I found him.” The deflection is weak, and her expression falls into something dark.

“The internship?” She asks. The air quotes around ‘internship’ are nearly audible in the quiet.

“It was- it was a cover-up. To protect his identity.”

“But _why?_ Why did you bring him in?”

“I’m sure you’ve heard about _the Accords._ ” Stark’s tone turns bitter and harsh, spitting out the words in an almost sarcastic tone. “About Leipzig, and Lagos and Berlin.”

“Yeah, what about them? What does _that_ have to do with _this?”_ Another choking wave of grief slams into her, sending her briefly choking in an ocean of hurt.

Her baby is stuck away from home, hurt, and alone. _He’s alone._

“We were sent to apprehend Captain Rogers and his Rogue Avengers. I needed backup.” The news crashes into her, turning her chest ice-cold. He did _not_ just say he wanted to recruit her _child_ to fight in a _war_.

“I’m sorry, _what?!_ You recruited a _child_ to fight a _super soldier,_ and a bunch of other enhanced people?!”

“I didn’t _know_ he was a _child!_ I figured he was older!”

_“How?!”_

“I didn’t know his age until I first saw him! I was on limited time, and it’s hard to dig up information on anyone who doesn’t want to be found! All I had to go on was location, the clips on YouTube, and luck!”

“That doesn’t change the fact that you brought him in anyways!”

“I was out of time! I couldn’t let them gun down Captain America, and the kid benched a car! All I knew was that he was capable, and I _know_ it was wrong to bring him in, and I _hate_ myself for it, but _I had no choice.”_

“There’s always another choice.”

“You don’t think I know that…? If I could undo it- if I could- if I could go back and make sure I never got involved in the kid’s life, I would, because I promised myself I would _never_ let another goddamn kid get hurt because of my short-sightedness, my stupidity, my- my… I promised myself I’d never screw up a kid’s life. And I have. I just did. There is a _child_ lying in a _hospital bed_ in a _coma_ because I got involved in his life and I _fucked_ it up.” Stark’s breaths are harsh and quick, like he’s in the middle of a panic attack and losing his grip on reality.

May stays silent; ponders over what she heard. Stark’s bitter tone, the way his voice wavered at _kid,_ the almost familiar sound of self-depreciation… Suddenly, her rage against Tony seems no more useful than warped glass — all it’s done for her is screw over how she’s taking Tony’s reactions.

The man’s breathing sounds frenetic, and maybe even close to breaking. She opens her mouth to apologise, and-

“If it makes you feel any better, the kid smacked the shit out of Rogers and Ant-Man.” The words tumble through the phone, and May has to take a second. He’s- he’s _laughing._ Quietly, _desperately,_ but he’s laughing.

“He what?”

“The kid got his fair share of punches in, too.” It goes quiet. The information sinks in slowly.

When May tries to draw in a breath, it’s disrupted by a wheezing huff. And then she’s chuckling; in hysterical peals of laughter because _her kid fought Captain America._

She doesn’t really notice the tears rolling down her face at the same time.

Tony’s still talking, she notices, and tries to get her breathing under control again. The emotion sitting heavily in her chest isn’t amusement or happiness, it’s just… an endless cacophony of white noise; a combination of maybe every bad thing a person can feel. It’s like splitting in half.

“I built him a better, safer suit. Still got chucked about, but… I’m sorry.” May swipes at her tears. The room seems so quiet now, especially given the quiet, despondent air hanging about like an ominous cloud.

“We are really, really going to have to talk about this, Stark.”

“You’re well within your right to have questions, Mrs. Parker. I’ll do my best to answer them, but… I don’t know very much.” For some reason, the response sparks a flicker of irritation in her chest. She frowns.

“Well then, tell me what you _do_ know. It’s not like I can ask Peter.”

The time it takes for her to realise what she’s said is the first sign that she should sleep.

The gravity of her statement crashes into her abruptly.

“I need to sit down.” She mumbles woozily. It occurs to her that she hasn’t taken in a breath in a while now, and her head’s getting all fuzzy.

She’s trying to stop herself from hyperventilating, and she’s succeeding in all the wrong ways. _Peter is in a coma._

He’s in a coma. He might- there’s always a chance that he might not wake up. Oh _god,_ she’s got so much to tell him, and she might be out of time to do it.

May can’t help but feel she’s teetering on the edge of a cliff, about to spiral into a complete breakdown because she could lose _everything_ and she hasn’t prepared for that; she hadn’t even considered the possibilities that she could lose Peter.

She shouldn’t have to.

“May? Are you okay?” May knows he’s genuinely worried (it’s the way he speaks, quiet but steady), but… she’s _not._ She won’t be for a while.

“No, I am not okay! I am _not_ okay! My kid is in a _coma_ because he’s a _superhero_ and you _knew_ and you didn’t tell me!” To her humiliation, her voice has turned teary and her throat is thick with emotion. She can’t help but be slightly embarrassed that she’s losing it in front of _Tony Stark._

“I know it feels impossible, but I need you to _breathe._ You’re having a panic attack. Listen. Copy my breaths or something.” Begrudgingly, May copies Tony’s exaggerated breathing patterns through the phone.

And it works. After a few minutes of breathing exercises _(in for four, hold for seven, release for eight, why does he sound so familiar with it?),_ her mind stops being foggy and starts clearing up again. Rationality is a cool balm on her mind, but it’s not enough. May is about to speak again when-

“He didn’t tell you to keep you safe.” Tony is defeated. That’s the only word she can begin to assign to the hollow, wounded tone he’s holding.

It reignites the flames burning in her chest.

“Safe? I nearly had a heart attack, I am- I’m not safe. I should _not_ be feeling this stressed out.” She _shouldn’t._ Her heart is pounding so hard she’s dizzy. Actually, she wonders if she’s about to have a heart attack or pass out, because this can’t be natural.

“He didn’t tell you so you wouldn’t worry, May. I know you’re angry at me, at him, and you have the right to be. Just please, remember that he was trying to keep you safe and out of the way of anyone who might come for him.”

“He’s fifteen, people shouldn’t be coming for him!” May hates how her eyes are burning with unshed tears. She wants to be _angry._ She wants to get all this anger out of her. But it’s too intense to deal with, and she can’t help it when warmth starts trailing down her cheeks.

“I know.”

Defeated, again. He sounds hollow.

“You _don’t._ You don’t know. I- I can’t let him keep this up.”

Right now, she’s not thinking about all the people whose lives Peter has saved by being there for them. She’s not thinking of all the ways Spider-Man has bettered Queens, New York. She’s thinking about _her baby,_ up at the hospital by himself without anyone to stay by his side.

She’s thinking about Peter. Her baby. Her small, and fragile baby who’s up in the hospital and also _Spider-Man._

And if he keeps being Spider-Man, he’s going to keep getting hurt. And one day, he might not come home.

“May. He’s doing it to protect people. Something tells me he’s got more than enough reason to do so.” Tony’s voice turns solemn.

She goes cold. _Ben._ She knew Peter had picked himself up too quickly after being so depressed. She’d actually been so worried about Peter. He didn’t really eat, or drink, or sleep, or talk asides from when it was forcefully suggested for weeks after the incident. May had considered sending him to therapy more than once, because her baby had become a shadow of his normal self and just kept getting worse.

Then one day, he’d eaten something unprompted. Passed out on the couch, wrapped up in blankets and too-big clothes. Sipped reluctantly on some water. Peter had made progress so dizzyingly quickly that May had almost been worried about that, too, and now she knows it was because he had started- started going out to _fight criminals…_

“I need to sleep.” She whispers, mostly to herself. She can figure out what the hell is going on when she’s slept. She can pick the fractured shards of her life back up when she isn’t sleep-deprived.

“You do that. I’ll keep you posted.”

A splitting yawn fights to interrupt her, but she keeps it away just long enough to mumble, “Goodnight, Tony.”

“Night, May.”

The line clicks dead.

May looks around the apartment. It’s not _that_ messy. It’s the _Parker_ brand of neat _,_ and she’s much too tired to try to tidy it up a little. There’s nothing to do asides from sleep, now.

It’s disturbing to not get tackled into a hug before going to sleep. Instead, May lies down on the bed, curled into a ball facing the wall, clutching Ben’s jumper close to her chest. Tears run down her cheek, over her nose and onto the pillow, dampening the material. She doesn’t flip it over.

May stays there, motionless and silent, holding the sweater close, with her thoughts being buried under the knowledge that Peter is alone upstate, without her.

She didn’t call anyone, she realises. Peter’s school, Ned. But she’s making use of all of her available holiday hours now. Two weeks break.

She prays it’ll be enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> may parker needs a hug and also all the love the world has to offer, you can't change my mind


	4. Day 1, part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peter. The ferry. The coma. Briefly, Tony wishes that he didn’t remember, but retracts the thought as soon as he thinks it, because it feels like a disservice. What is, is, and he has no control over what happens now. The best he can do is be there for the kid and his aunt.
> 
> Tony shakes his head. All that can wait until he’s cleaned himself up — hell, he’s surprised he even managed to pass out for as long as he did. He isn’t used to sleeping in.
> 
> He’s getting too old for this. Next thing anyone knows, he’ll be using a cane and telling kids to get off his lawn.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> back on my bullshit, hello
> 
> this is. mostly unbeta'd. forgive any mistakes and far fetched medical science. i am no doctor

Hazily, Tony blinks awake. The world is fuzzy around the edges and takes a few seconds to come into proper focus. There’s something niggling on the edge of his consciousness, demanding he take notice of it. _What happened…?_ No aches or pressing thoughts, just some overwhelming emotion hanging over him. Tony looks around. He’s in his room, he’d stayed up pretty late to-

Oh.

That was real, then.

Tony sits, propped up by his arm, and uses the other to sweep his mussed hair away from his face.

“FRIDAY…? What time is it?”

 _‘It’s 13:35, Boss. You’ve been asleep for about six hours.’_ That is… less sleep than he would have wanted, especially after a sleepless streak, but more than he expected. To be honest, he’d thought he would have been up all night doing something else-

“Right, right, the research…” Tony mumbles as he stares down at his palms, blinking hard.

_Peter._ The ferry. The coma. Briefly, Tony wishes that he didn’t remember, but retracts the thought as soon as he thinks it, because it feels like a disservice. What is, is, and he has no control over what happens now. The best he can do is be there for the kid and his aunt.

Tony shakes his head. All that can wait until he’s cleaned himself up — hell, he’s surprised he even managed to pass out for as long as he did. He isn’t used to sleeping in.

He’s getting too old for this. Next thing anyone knows, he’ll be using a cane and telling kids to get off his lawn.

Tony sobers up quickly after that thought. If there’s _any_ kid hanging around the compound, he can be damned sure that it’ll be Parker once he’s recovered. With that thought, he whisks through his normal routine with unusual speed, showering briskly before pulling on an AC/DC shirt and black jeans, and steps out into the air-conditioned hallways of the compound. He shudders a little — he and Pepper both prefer the warmth of their room.

There’s more people around now. Tony offers quiet greetings whenever he passes anyone, waving and smile-grimacing at them. The fact that something has gone horribly wrong is definitely apparent to those who see him walking, because Tony can almost taste the sympathy in the air as he strides. However, despite the lingering heaviness, Tony feels more like himself than he has in a long time.

It might be the fact that he’s not keeping up any professionalism right now, or it might be the fact that he’s had more contact with his emotions (Howard would be mortified, but screw him) in the past day than he has for years previous. But Tony feels _normal._ Kind of. Well, his mentee is in a coma and his emotional state is in shambles, but what else is new, right?

He’s in the corridor connecting the bedrooms to the Avengers’ common room and the medical wing. He’s got a choice here — go straight to the hospital and have Pepper kill him when she finds out he’s not taking care of himself, or do the responsible thing and actually eat.

Well. Pepper is a force to be reckoned with, even when she isn’t present. So he makes a brief stop at the common room to snag some toast — he knows it’s not a proper breakfast, and he knows Pepper will be on his ass about it later anyways, but really? He just wants to go to Peter again. Logically, Tony knows there hasn’t been any declination of his condition overnight because Helen would have informed him promptly, but he’s still paranoid about it.

It’s good toast, at least. He’s still hungry, but the unsettled sensation he has in his stomach is a clear indication that he won’t be able to eat much more. Tony sips at a glass of water instead of drinking the coffee he would usually have, and nibbles on a few orange segments. Some of the haze over his mind clears up as he stares out the floor-to-ceiling windows onto the peaceful greenery nearby. He can almost imagine the quiet rustling of leaves.

He sighs, morose. The world just seems that little bit harder to enjoy. Tony lets his mind lull as he ponders, thoughts flitting through his head lazily.

It’d be better if he had Happy or Rhodey with him, but it’s probably for the best that he doesn’t drag them down into this depressive state with him. They’ve got their own things to do, so he supposed he can just try to keep this guilt under wraps.

He has a suspect feeling that he’s doing a bad job at it.

_Well,_ he thinks as he stretches, reaching for the ceiling, _at least it’s not worse._ Lots of things could have turned the situation even more sour…

_Like May finding out about Spider-Man._

Well, fuck.

Tony winces as he remembers that May knows now, and damn, that’s gonna make it really complicated to explain things now, especially as Parker is still unconscious. She’s gonna have a helluva lot of questions that he won’t be able to answer. Actually, thinking along those lines, he’s pretty worried about the kid’s aunt — finding _that_ out and seeing her nephew hospitalised all in one day has to be really overwhelming, and it can’t be doing her mental state too many favours.

He’s tense when he clears his stuff away, shoulders refusing to unknot and relax. There’s just this _tugging_ sensation in his chest — is it guilt, trepidation, or anxiety? — and it digs its claws in deep.

Tony shakes his head. _No._ He shouldn’t think negatively because it only breeds more of it; _maybe_ there’s something to be gained. He straightens his posture, determination strengthening his spine. If he can explain this whole thing to May, slowly and calmly, maybe Peter won’t wake up to a grilling.

He resolutely ignores the little itch at the back of his head as he cleans up after himself; the burning in his palms. He’s used to being so _proactive_ in the face of disasters, like when he had to find a way to stabilise Pepper’s Extremis, or build Rhodey’s leg braces. He’d always had something to build to help his injured family and lay his guilt partially to rest. But- there’s nothing he can do here. Nothing he can build to fix or at least alleviate the issue. He can’t help.

He’s never liked waiting.

He _hates_ being unable to help.

Tony casts a sweeping look over the room — it’s like he wasn’t even there to start with. _Good._ He kinda wants to keep a low profile for now, and being a bit of a ghost for a while should (maybe) take some of the stress from him. Tony is a lot more comfortable, feeling more like _himself_ than he has in a while, when he starts the journey towards the medical wing. He tries to keep his pace as neutral as possible so his panic doesn’t show through as prominently as he feels it.

(Because being panicked is the same as caring, and he’s still so _scared_ of caring for this child. Tony doesn’t want Howard to screw up someone as pure and _good_ as Peter.)

The gentle _thump_ of each footstep sending vibrations through his body is a pleasant sensation; a grounding, repetitive series of movements. Tony counts them. The constant rhythm soothes him, on some level, because when he finally drifts away from the mental cataloguing of _how many steps does it take to reach the medical wing,_ he’s in front of Helen’s door. He starts, but pushes the door open anyways.

The light pouring into the room through slits in the blinds gives it a much less oppressive feel that it had yesterday, in the dark after hours of panic and grief and _oh god, what if Peter dies,_ and the edges of Tony’s anxieties are smoothed out surprisingly quickly. Helen stands to greet him, wearing a warm-yet-tired smile and _yeah,_ Tony really gets that feeling.

“Morning, Helen.”

“Tony. Did you sleep?” The scrutinising eye scanning him almost makes him shuffle backwards from the intensity. He winces.

“Straight to the point, wow- And not really, no. Kind of hard to.”

“Tony.” Her eyes are compassionate, but steely. He scuffs his feet along the floor like a scolded kid.

“Yeah, I know. But- Any major changes? With the kid?”

“Oh, right- He’s healing, fast. Faster than anything I’ve _ever_ seen before, even. He’s taken over from the ventilator; did so during the night. We’re guessing his internal organs are healing first as a sort of priority in his body, but… he’s amazing.” Helen’s voice is almost awed. Tony blinks — while he’s been mourning over his not-quite loss of his not-quite mentee, Helen’s got another enhanced under her care. It must be interesting. Parker’s abilities aren’t run-of-the-mill for an enhanced, anyways. He should really let Helen get a closer look at the kid’s genetic code — with his permission, obviously.

“That’s- that’s great. Any other improvements?”

“He’s healing quickly. High-nutrition food would do him better, but he can’t have that until he’s woken up and we can make sure he’s okay.” Tony nods. Yeah, that makes sense.

Peter’s clambering back up onto his feet a lot quicker than he expected. It’s bizarre. Only yesterday was the kid dying in his arms. Choking to death on his own blood… Tony feels his left arm give a protesting twitch to the thought. He should probably get that checked out at some point.

“Yeah, that’s- thank you, Helen, _so much._ I dunno what I’d’ve done if we’d lost him-”

Being sad about this- it’s like a depressive wave. One second, Tony’s in complete awareness of his mind and what he’s thinking about, how trying to find solutions to this problem makes his mind die down while he ponders; how determination lends some kind of clarity to his thoughts, but- then the guilt hits, and all that clarity dies down and he’s hardly got any energy left in him and he wants nothing more than to lie down somewhere and go to sleep for a few decades. Tony shakes his head slightly, focusing on a spot on the floor.

He can’t let himself wallow like that. Being sad won’t fix any problems.

“’s my fault anyway, the kid shouldn’t have had to-”

“Tony.” Helen’s hand is under his chin, forcing him to regain eye contact (when did he look away?). He almost flinches away again, before he catches himself and buries the childish instinct.

He can almost _hear_ Howard berating him for not being ‘made of iron’ or whatever the crap that bullshit metaphor was meant to mean. Who says that to a _kid,_ anyway?

“Come on, you have to stop blaming yourself for this.”

...maybe. He makes a noncommittal noise and waves a hand around vaguely.

He’ll stop feeling guilty when the kid wakes up.

“And his Aunt is coming back up, I assume?”

“Oh, yeah. May would probably kill me on the spot if I refused her- not that I would, I’m not always an asshole.” Tony has to bite down on the inside of his cheek to stop himself from entering that wonderful phase of anxiety called _rambling._ That’s kind of not the way he should go about this if he wants to keep up the ‘this isn’t affecting my ability to work’ facade.

“Do you want to keep her informed about his progress, or should I do it? I’d understand if you didn’t want to, Tony, and you don’t have to, either. This- this is a horrific event for both of you. You don’t have to be fine.” And Helen’s reading him like a book. Again.

Is he really that obvious…? The part about it being a generally, all-round bad experience for both him and Parker makes sense in his head, because yeah, the kid’s in a coma and he’s got a nagging feeling he won’t be sleeping for a while, but the part about him not having to be fine just about flies clear over his head. He’s always been fine, always has been, always will be. The world’s too big and fast and demanding for him not to be fine, he’s always got things to do and places to be, inventions to create and people to help.

“You should take some time off.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Time off, Tony. Nobody’s going to mind if you just take some holiday- and I know you’ve got loads of it stacking up, you _never_ take time off.”

_Maybe because I don’t deserve it._

“Yeah, maybe. Maybe…” Tony squeezes his hands together behind his back, pushing his chest out so a few vertebrae pop back into place. _That’s better._

Actually, that doesn’t sound like too bad an idea. He should contact Pepper about it. She’ll probably support him in his endeavours to get some sleep. The information that he’s feeling like shit because he’s feeling guilty about his mentee being in a coma (and his spectacular failure at being a mentor) might throw her off her rhythm, but he hopes she’ll understand anyway. He resolves to do that at some point. It might (probably not, but he can hope) do him some good.

“Yeah. I’ll do that.”

“Please do. You need a break as well, y’know.” Tony huffs out a breath, his gaze anywhere _but_ Helen. She knows him too well for his own good, he swears.

“Don’t remind me. After I’ve called Pep, can I go in to…?”

“What-? Oh, yeah. That’s fine. Try not to be too loud.”

Tony pulls a face. “Why would I be loud?”

“I don’t know. But you said he’s got delicate senses, and it’d probably be a bad move to overwhelm him now.” Helen explains carefully. She looks almost uncertain, and Tony has a brief flash of sympathy for her — she’s got Parker, an enhanced, under her wing with little to no further studies on his abilities. They’re flying blind in terms of this recovery. Tony nods.

“Got it. No loud noises. Easy.” She gives him a little smile before he slips out of the room, phone already in hand. He’s dialling Pepper’s number almost out of reflex.

He waits patiently as the phone quietly bleeps, and then the feed connects and he’s greeted by Pepper’s (beautiful, how could he have ever deserved someone like her?) face on the screen.

“Pep.” He suspects his grimace-smile probably gives something away, because her fond expression quickly melts away into something concerned, and he’s left to wonder (again) what he did to deserve her.

“Tony. Is everything okay…? You said you’d be fine while I was gone.”

“Yeah, that was- _before-_ but- Helen’s recommending I take some time off.” He carefully explains. It’s pretty vague, and yeah, maybe he doesn’t really want to talk about how his intern / mentee / charge is in a goddamn coma because that makes it too real, even to someone he loves and trusts like Pepper.

 _“What-?_ What’s happened?”

He sucks in a breath. “You want the long version or the short version?”

“I’m coming home tonight.” _Oh, thank god._ He’s not sure he’ll be able to do another night without Pepper to bring him out of the nightmares. “But I’ll take the short version. What’s wrong?” Tony pauses, and forcibly separates his hands from one another. For someone who learned at such a young age to hide all nervous mannerisms, he’s still got an alarming number of them.

“Uh- the kid I took under my wing in Germany is in a _coma_ and I’m really stressed out right now.”

That… was _not_ how he wanted that to come out. Maybe less blunt. Or less _that._ This is going great so far. Awesome.

_“...what?”_ Her voice is shocked. He can relate to that, he’s pretty sure he still is. Her eyebrows are furrowed.

“It’s been a bad day.”

“What?!”

“Yeah.”

_“What?!”_

“Yeah.” Tony scratches a spot just below his nape and rests his weight backwards so he’s leaning against the (too cold) wall.

“What happened?!”

“Well- a lot of things. Lots of tiny, small things that turned into a big, ugly picture and I need a break before I do something stupid and very inadvisable.” He’s not exactly lying, either. The stupid part of him wants to just hole himself up in his lab and not return for a few weeks.

“Why are you asking me?” He can still read concern prominently in Pepper’s expression, one that’s woefully familiar to him now. It’d be nice to be able to have her hold him, just until he can get his head back in the game. But that’s not happening.

Tony sucks in a breath. “You’re the CEO?”

“Try again.”

“You’re the only person I can ask without fear of them blabbing or saying I’ve got an illegitimate kid.” He can’t bring that shitstorm down on anyone, let alone someone as young and vulnerable as Peter. Not to mention the stress it’d put May under. Tony may be off to a bad start as a mentor, but that doesn’t mean he’s gonna let himself slip up again.

“Better. And yes, time off is fine-”

“Thank you so much, Pep.” He says in a single exhale, eyelids sliding shut. He’s so goddamn _tired,_ but he just can’t get himself to sleep, and he’s got a nagging feeling that it’s just going to be like that for a while, now.

“That’s not a problem, honey, but- are _you_ okay?”

“What-? I’m alive and _not_ in a coma.” He watches Pepper’s expression pinch into a frown before it smooths out again, but he can still tell the expression is somewhat forced. She’s worrying about him. Which, really, isn’t necessary because he’s not the one in a medically induced coma and it’s mostly-kinda his fault this whole shebang is happening now anyway. If he’d just kept a closer eye on the kid, or just been less distant of a mentor to him- this might now have happened. Parker’s a nice kid who’s just trying his best — he didn’t deserve the cold, harsh distance Tony had been maintaining after Germany. So yeah, maybe this is on him too. Oh, who’s he kidding — it’s as much his fault as it is Peter’s.

The part of him that thinks in the mechanical, constructive way asks _what can we do to fix this?_

The part of him that’s creative and rational urges him to make something to distract himself.

The part of him that cares grieves.

The part of him that Howard broke wants to keep the distance before he hurts the kid more.

Tony, as a whole, is confused. There’s a lot of paths he can take from here, and he doesn’t know which is the right one.

But then again, he’s never really known what the right thing to do in a situation is. He’s just got his heart and his mind, in the end, and they haven’t led him astray since after his eyes were opened to what he’d been doing with his brain in Afghanistan.

“-ony? Are you still there?”

He blinks, his eyes refocusing. He really needs to get a grip on himself, jesus. “Yep-! I’m still here. Kinda.”

“I’ll be home tonight, okay? Just hang on ‘til then.” Tony offers a weak smile, and gets one in response. He can wait. Pepper looks to the side on the screen, and Tony knows that she’s being called away now.

“Love you, Pepper.”

“I love you too, Tony.” The screen goes dark, and Tony slips his phone back into his pocket.

He slumps down the side of the wall and lets his arm fall from the back of his neck to the floor. Normally, he’d feel slightly warmer and lighter in the chest after talking to Pepper. So why does he feel so… empty? No, that’s not it- the stifling cloud in his chest isn’t like he’s missing something, or he’s in shock-

The closest word he can tie to whatever the hell is wrong with him is _saudade,_ and even then, it feels wrong. Horror doesn’t fit it, sadness doesn’t fit it, grief is close, but not quite there- simply put, he’s just _sad._ He’s just sad because that’s a _kid_ in a coma, and that’s his fault. An innocent kid. _Peter._ The wide-eyed, overly excitable kid he took with him to Germany to kick ass with and then didn’t speak to properly again until he nearly got drowned.

Jesus, and the Vulture- he needs to get that suit to the lab sooner rather than later, because the guy’s _insane_ and he’s going to do yet another thing that Tony can’t agree with. First, the bastard tries to drown a kid for doing the right thing, and now he’s gonna try and get tech capable of killing even more people just for some money. Tony can’t let that happen.

He owes Parker that much.

But first? He’s gonna check up on the resident spiderling. Hearing that he’s okay is one thing, but actually seeing it…? Maybe it can take some of the crushing guilt off Tony’s chest. Or make it worse. Either way, he _has_ to make sure that the kid’s as alright as he can be. It feels like the right step in the right direction.

Tony palms the sleek case of the phone in his pocket as he follows the halls to the room he knows is Peter’s, the other arm swinging lightly in the cool air in an attempt to cool down his overheating hand. Something about holding the phone soothes him. Maybe it’s the feeling of something solid and tangible in his grip. Or it could be the promise of Pepper’s return home later on, and some form of emotional stability. Either way, it just comforts him on the same level he was comforted by Maria when he’d skinned his knee as a kid. It feels safe.

What doesn’t feel safe is the hospital door in front of him. He’s been in a lot of hospitals before. He isn’t sure if his anxiety is flaring up as a result of bad memories or if it’s just because it’s the kid in there. Tony sucks in a breath at the sight of the door, but doesn’t hesitate further in pushing it open. It’s cool on his palms; stealing away some of the overwhelming heat he’d wanted to get rid of.

Stepping into Peter’s room isn’t as sharply off-putting as it was yesterday. He looks diminutive still, but there are even less tubes surrounding him than there were before. Actually- the kid looks slightly more natural now. Less like he’s in a coma, and more like he’s sleeping, to Tony’s relief. He’s still much too pale to be healthy, and the slight frown on his expression disturbs some anxious, worried part of him, but he’s still alive. He’s still clinging on. So Tony can deal with the guilt that’s performing acupuncture on his heart.

 _But this is your fault,_ a voice that sounds a helluva lot like Howard murmurs, _this was your responsibility and look where it’s wound up. You ruin things, Anthony, you break everything you touch. Look how your mother and I wound up._

So many people in his life have died. That voice- it’s got weight behind the thoughts. He’s always holding himself accountable for everything he does wrong, and it keeps happening, even when he’s trying to protect things. Maybe he’s cursed.

Tony looks at Parker again, and can’t help the involuntary shudder that runs through him. He can’t let someone so young be killed, and it seems like too much of a coincidence to assume this Vulture guy popping up right after Germany’s fight are unrelated. He put the kid in the limelight — then _this._

They’ve got to be linked, or the kid’s got some serious bad luck.

Tony lets his gaze fall upon the window. The trees move calmly with the breeze, and the world out there seems so far away from his own turmoil that associating the two feels insurmountable. How can so much unrest be connected with such a calm place? He leans forward, fingers drumming against his cheekbone. People walk across the compound from building to building with energy he couldn’t muster, greeting each other with waves before continuing on their way. Tony huffs a quiet sigh and pulls his phone out of his pocket, quickly opening up the assload of emails he’s managed to compile in less than two days of being AWOL. Sure, he’s on leave and Pepper won’t approve, but he’s got to do _something_ to distract himself-

Or...

Tony nearly leaps out of his chair when he hears a noise, quiet and shushed, before brushing it off as one of the doors down the hallway being swept open. He _can_ hear quiet, tapping footsteps moving closer, then further away again. He sits back in his chair, suspiciously peering out the door and around the room before returning to his phone.

He can just chat with Rhodey. That’s not work based, and it gives him something to do. He quickly snaps off a message.

14:13 

**tonsillitis:** Hey, platypus.

Tony snorts when his chat name finally goes through his brain. Wow. Okay- He’s not gonna lie, he forgot about that one.

**tonsillitis:** I can’t believe you didn’t change my name back.

14:14 

**tonsillitis:** Seriously, when did you change it to tonsillitis? Months ago. Joke’s old now, Rhodey.

 **tonsillitis:** I can’t believe you never fixed that.

14:28 

**Jimbo:** Because you never changed mine back from ‘Jimbo’. Stalemate, tonsillitis.

**tonsillitis:** I hate you.

14:30 

**Jimbo:** You love me. Now, what’s up?

**tonsillitis:** Does anything have to be up for me to want to talk to my favourite honey bear?

**Jimbo:** Yes. Please don’t tell me you’re beating yourself up still.

14:34 

**Jimbo:** Tony.

**tonsillitis:** Why does everyone assume I’d beat myself up?

**Jimbo:** Because of your crippling self-esteem issues and guilt complex?

14:36 

Tony winces.

**tonsillitis:** Ouch.

**Jimbo:** It’s true though. So do you wanna just… not do that? I’ll set Pepper on you.

**tonsillitis:** I’ve already asked Pepper for time off per Helen’s request, what more can you guys want from me?

14:37 

**Jimbo:** For you to stop hating yourself?

**tonsillitis:** Tried it, failed it, let’s move on. I need a distraction. Be distracting, you wonderful human being.

**Jimbo:** You were never this weird at MIT.

**tonsillitis:** Nah, I was a closeted idiot back then. The stupid is free, honey bear, and it feels great.

14:38 

**tonsillitis:** You know what else would feel great? ;)

**Jimbo:** Please stop propositioning me. You’re with Pepper, remember?

**tonsillitis:** :(

 **tonsillitis:** She loves you too, you know.

14:39 

**Jimbo:** Did you seriously just use a frowny face?

 **Jimbo:** And she loves me like a brother, dumbass, stop making things weird.

**tonsillitis:** You ask too much of me.

**Jimbo:** Yeah, apparently so. Just keep yourself calm over there, Tony. I can come over if you need to talk to someone.

14:40 

**tonsillitis:** Nah, you don’t have to do that. Thanks for the offer, though.

**Jimbo:** It’s not like you’re forcing me there, Tony. Should I?

He’s still tapping away at his phone when he hears it again: a very quiet, _very_ soft noise; a tiny little exhale of breath that is nearly silent, but slightly louder than normal. It’s barely audible and he wouldn’t have caught it without the silence of the room. Eyes wide, he turns a questioning look at Parker.

He’s still sleeping.

Well, not _sleeping,_ as such, just coma-ing his injuries away. Actually, that’s a thing — he did enough research to maybe make sense of the whole coma thing, last night. He’s pretty sure Helen induced the coma just so the kid would recover faster, not because of any underlying catastrophic head trauma that’s caused it. So hopefully _(hopefully),_ the drugs keeping the kid under should do their job while he heals. Hopefully.

So, even though he’s armed with this knowledge, he can’t help allow suspicions to develop in his head slowly. If Parker’s metabolism were to pick back up, the drugs wouldn’t be enough, and he’d start to wake up, right…? But- Even if he wants the kid to wake up (which he does), it’s too soon. So he blames the thoughts on his own wishful thinking and drops it.

**tonsillitis:** No need, I’m fine. Thanks for the offer, though.

14:43 

**Jimbo:** No problem, Tones. Take it easy.

**tonsillitis:** I always do.

Tony slumps down in his chair, staring blearily out the window with a yawn. He’s exhausted. It’s like a physical weight, pulling down on his limbs. He’s exhausted, but it’s incomparable to what he’s brought upon the Parkers. Well- the kid’s in a coma, his Aunt probably hasn’t slept at all, so his troubles-?

He’s peachy.

_Peachy._

Actually, he’s gotta check up on the kid’s Aunt, too. It’s not his place, not really, but he’s _worried_ because this can’t be easy on her, not with her kid how he is, and damn it, he knows how it feels to see family in hospital, alone and small and unresponsive, and how much it can damage a person. Peter, May… they’ve both got some background, melancholic tone in their voices; the kind that can only come from grieving, so- they’ve lost someone. Recently. Probably. So May might be contending with _that_ grief on top of _this,_ too. That’s too much for anyone to handle alone, even him, and even if he’s unwelcome at the minute it’s the only way he might be able to help May.

14:55 

**T.S:** Mrs. Parker.

15:03 

**May Parker:** Stark.

Tony winces. That’s bad. That’s _bad_ bad. It’s understandable, though, because she just found out her nephew is Spider-Man and the huge lie that’s been under her nose for months, alongside his recent involvement in the whole situation. That iciness is _not_ the best start but hey, it’s a start and it’s better than nothing.

**T.S:** Are you okay?

**May Parker:** I’m on my way up. Any news?

**T.S:** He was extubated overnight. He’s starting to take over from the machines again, which is good. I’ll keep you posted.

15:14 

**May Parker:** We’ll talk when I’m there.

And never has a single message seemed so foreboding _in his life._ He’s pretty sure he should fear the woman a lot more than he does, but he can’t bring himself to do it — after all, Peter’s condition is kind of definitely mostly _his_ fault for not being communicative, so…

He looks across at Peter.

“Your aunt is _terrifying._ Seriously. She and Pepper- I’d cry if they teamed up.” It’s silent in response, but he finds that the kid’s quiet, nearly even, _non-mechanical_ breaths are enough for him.

Parker’s gotten skinnier since Germany. Not that he hadn’t been scrawny before, but now he’s about two steps away from downright skeletal. Tony itches to do something to rectify that; when Parker wakes up, he’s definitely gonna make sure the kid eats. A lot. Another side-effect of that metabolism: the poor kid likely isn’t eating enough anyways. He can fix that.

“Shoulda told you I had people looking into it, huh?”

He did. Hell, he got the FBI to track the Vulture’s movements, but this still happened. It’s always communication. That’s always been his major downfall.

He can almost hear Howard telling him just how much he’s already screwed up, how he can screw up even more. How he’s a disgrace to the Stark name because of his constant misjudgements and emotional tendencies.

He wants to not give a damn.

It’s never that easy.

_Howard fucking Stark._

Instead of thinking any further, Tony just sits there next to Peter, silent, spending time in the room with the kid (and praying to a god he doesn’t believe in that Parker knows he isn’t alone), watching people move about outside the compound. Life goes on, even if he can’t. It’s just… it’s always like that. Always will be. He can’t change how that works, so he might as well try to be _somewhat_ productive in the meantime.

Tony looks down to his phone.

Then he hears a shift of fabric. What could be a teeny huff. It takes a few seconds for the sounds to register, and _hey, aren’t I the only person in the-_

_-room…_

Alarmed, he turns around.

The stillness of the picture before him still disturbs him — like an oil painting, beautifully emotional, something he feels he can’t move for lest he disturbs the image. It’s too peaceful. He tries not to think of Yinsen’s body, stilling abruptly, the overwhelming silence and the emptiness that followed, the _pain_ in his chest ripping him to shreds yet again, but…

It’s too similar. It’s the same guilt gnawing at him from the inside now, the same responsibility and admiration being poisoned slowly by his sense of responsibility in the matters, and really, he _never_ should have gotten involved in Peter’s life because this has happened. He looks at the kid. Small, diminutive. Something that needs protecting.

Well- sure, Parker can catch a bus and floor a Giant-Man, but Tony feels the urge to protect him nonetheless. He can’t tell if it’s because of his failure to protect the kid under his responsibility already, or if it’s just because of how much of himself he can already recognise in the kid, but he _does_ and he can’t ignore it.

He feels like he’s on the cusp of something, but _what_ it is lies on the tip of his tongue and beyond reach all the same. But the noises- Tony shakes his head slowly, and goes back to staring out the window. His silly, desperate hope is getting the best of him. The kid’s in a coma. Will be for a while. He needs to stop hoping that something could happen instantly, because even with a healing factor like Peter’s, the kid should be _very_ much dead and it is far beyond the realms of hope that he’d wake up soon.

God, this much turmoil over _a kid._ If he’d known this was going to happen before Germany, he…

Probably would have brought him along anyway.

He can’t think of a reason why. He just would have. It was one of those gut feelings anyway, one of those _this is meant to happen_ moments that have played so large a part in his life and will continue to do so. His mind and all those remaining insecurities Howard planted are still very much present, but Tony _knows_ his heart’s investment in the kid is stronger than that, and it’s weird, but Tony’s not strong enough to ignore the feeling.

Doesn’t want to, either.

So he cares about Peter a _little_ more than he would the average intern. It’s not like Howard is gonna pop out of his grave to make Tony fuck it up.

It’s on him now. He can decide what happens next. He can decide how he progresses with his life now.

The thought’s kinda freeing, actually.

_Reality check._

The third noise — a breath, that was definitely a breath, a little wheezy and rattling but a _breath_ — is something he can’t ignore. Tony whirls around from his position facing the window.

The kid’s eyelids flutter a little. It’s not much; hardly even a twitch but Tony has learned to be _very_ observant in his life, and he definitely saw that.

And it’d be safe to say that Tony’s heart stops dead in its tracks. He hasn’t had enough time to prepare for this. He hasn’t had enough time to think about what he’ll say to Peter so he can be reassuring. A _day._ It’s been a _day._ Nobody, not even Peter with his too-fast healing factor, could bounce back from this. It’s too good (hopefully) to be true. Actually, scrap that thought- this is _bad._ Peter hasn’t had enough time to recover from the extensive blood loss, and even if the sedatives keeping him under are being burned away faster than they’re being pumped in, it doesn’t mean the kid’s better. So Tony waits. He waits there, sitting awkwardly next to Peter’s bed, a multitude of possible responses to an impossible to guess question lying just on the tip of his tongue. But, the longer he waits for Peter’s eyes to open and for the kid to move, the more obvious it becomes that he’ll have to wait a long, long while for those retorts to be of use — Peter’s settled down again now, expression slack once again.

Tony’s heart is still flying in his chest, making his brain throb with his anxiety. That- Peter shouldn’t have even _shifted._ He should be so far unconscious that it’d make a _dead_ man jealous. But he _moved._ Or he tried. His stomach is in his throat and he can _feel_ that his eyes are slightly wider than they’d normally be, but what can he do, because the kid in a goddamn _coma_ just _twitched_ despite only having sustained mortal, _life-threatening_ injuries _yesterday._

The grief is gone, replaced by the agitated sort of anxiety that comes with the spiking adrenaline and his heart _thu-thumping_ in his chest much harder than before. Peter’s eyes _fluttered._ They shouldn’t have, they definitely should _not_ moved even a _fraction_ of a millimetre, but they _did_ and the disequilibrium he’s been thrown into is _killing him._

He wants Peter to wake up, he really does. But not if it’ll set the kid’s healing back like this. But still, he’s got that lingering question-

“What do I do if you’re not the same Peter who wrecked the ferry…?”

As expected, he receives no response.

But he feels himself deflate like he’d been hoping for one.

This is messed up. He knows it. He, _Tony Stark,_ is waiting at a child’s bedside for a miracle recovery that isn’t going to be easy, if it’s even possible. He can’t help but feel that it’s recompense for all the children his weapons have hospitalised. All the innocent kid’s his weapons had _killed_ before this.

And it fucking _hurts._

_This was never meant to happen._

He spares a thought to May, to how demolished she must feel with her own grief, and tries to turn his attention towards that instead. He can’t help Peter. He knows that. Reluctantly, he’ll even accept that. But _May-_ she’s a different story entirely. He can try to help her in any way he can, and he’s going to do his best to help this family back onto their feet again.

Tony knows he’s not a patient man by nature.

But he’s damn well willing to learn how to be one. Peter’s recovery… it’s gonna be full of setbacks and frustration and all those other things Helen tells him to actively avoid because of his heart, but he can’t just _not_ be there. He’s tried that. Now the kid’s in a coma. So really, logically, the best thing to do to prevent this from happening again is to just be there for him, right?

Yeah. Tony looks at Peter; at the pale face and the hallmarks of a death-like slumber written all over him, and the sinking feeling he’d been growing familiar with is replaced with what can only be described as a strengthening of his resolve. He can’t change the fact that Peter’s here, now, in a coma. He can’t change how sheet-white he is from blood loss. He can’t change how still the room is.

But he can make sure it doesn’t happen again.

He can keep a closer eye on Peter, make sure the kid doesn’t go in over his head again.

Then again-

He’s going in circles now, endless loops of the same destructive thoughts, but he can’t seem to shake himself out of the holding pattern he seems to be stranded in, mind far from the ground and pursuing the same endless nothing. What can he gain by constantly tearing himself down? Right, the acknowledgement that this is his own fault.

Then again-

Tony rests his head in his hands and groans, maybe just a little bit louder than he usually would. This is- it’s so _frustrating._ He wants to be able to live without feeling guilty, but then he tries to absolve himself of it but he doesn’t deserve that and the cycle loops, again and again and again… he’s tired of it.

It looks like that’s another cycle for him to break. He won’t let this continue. If he’s not gonna allow Howard to screw up anything else, he might as well try to put a stop to his own needless guilt complex, right?

He’s so wrapped up in his own thoughts that he doesn’t quite notice the change from silent to marginally more _alive._

Realistically, he knows it shouldn’t happen, but against all odds, it happens again. Tony jolts from his thoughts, suddenly anxious, and watches pale eyelids twitch again. They cease moving before they can open fully, but that’s _another_ incident. It’s like the universe is goddamn _fucking_ with him now. Dangling Peter’s consciousness in front of him like it’s some sick reward, one that he can’t reach, and yanking it away when Tony finally reaches some kind of emotional equilibrium. He wants to be angry; wants to lash out at the world for being as cruel as it is, but he can’t muster the energy at the minute.

He just looks on. Part of him, the same part of him that wants to wrap the kid up and force the world to be nice to him, wants to grab the kid’s hand so he knows he’s not alone, but despite all the resolving and the thinking he’s been doing in small attempts to overcome his Howard Stark issues, he just… can’t do it. Physically, yes, he can, but…

Peter’s _small._ And too skinny. Tony feels like enough of a detriment just by being in the same room as him, but to make contact… it just seems especially abhorrent for him to do. He doesn’t want to break the kid or something.

He’ll just wait until May comes back up. He knows he’s not in a good place with her regarding Spider-Man, and really, he can’t blame her for being super pissed off. He’ll take the brunt of that. That’s his responsibility as the kid’s mentor, even if he’s done a stunningly bad job at it until now. Maybe he can even get her to come around on _why_ before the kid wakes up.

Twice.

That’s two impossible situations within…

Tony checks his phone. Within about an hour of each other. It’s 4:00 P.M. now, so May should be about… maybe half an hour away? That’s a time window he’s not quite comfortable with, but he’s off work now for a while and that’s sorted with Pepper. He’s had a brief, but nice chat with Rhodey, too. He slept in a few hours longer than normal. If there’s any day where he’s equipped to deal with a distraught aunt and her comatose nephew, that’ll be today.

“Your aunt should be here soon, kid. Let’s just hope she doesn’t kill me.” Tony mumbles, mostly into his chest, but it seems to ring out like a gunshot nonetheless.

He has a brief flash where he’s completely convinced that it should be him lying on that hospital bed, vulnerable and frail-looking and oh-too desperately needing protecting. Peter’s condition- it leaves a helluva lot to be desired, really. Massive blood loss. Oxygen deprivation. Potential brain damage. Muscular damage, fractured ribs from what FRIDAY had called a _‘close combat situation’_ prior to the ferry… and Tony has a comparatively _sparkling_ bill of health. It doesn’t sit right with him.

He sucks in a breath. “This sucks.”

The silence agrees with him.

Tony exhales sharply.

“She- May said she’d bring some of your things up here for you. Helen says it might help you out, having familiar things around. Especially with your senses… when you wake up, we should talk about those. Don’t really know much about ‘em. I think it’d be nice. But if you don’t wanna, you can tell me to back off any time.”

The sound filling the room is pleasant compared to the silence, even if it is his own slightly hoarse voice, and his rambling. He thinks he might see a slight pinch of Parker’s expression again from lax to tense, but it’s gone in the same instant it arrived. Tony gives a sharp exhale through his nose, eyebrows furrowing. He’s gotta give credit where it’s due, he could never be a medical doctor or a nurse. It’s not that blood squicks him out, or that he can’t learn the material, but to care for so many people for such a long time… Tony knows what it is to stretch himself too far, too thin, for too long. And this is it, the aching eyes and the too-fast heart and the burrowing guilt inside him. It’s familiar, almost comforting, but the kid in front of him, small and vulnerable… this is it.

He’s out of his depth. He knows he is.

Something in his periphery catches his attention.

But it feels different this time. In his gut, something feels different. It feels wrong, and it’s weighing heavily on his gut. Swallowing back the choking sensation, Tony turns to face the bed.

It’s the same fluttering as before. The trepidation doesn’t die down, though. He can feel his hands moving of their own accords, twitching randomly against his thigh, tapping sporadic patterns, because yeah, he’s panicked, this whole thing is _leagues_ out of his understanding but he’s pretty goddamn sure this shouldn’t be happening. Maybe he’s having a nightmare, one he can’t wake up from. It seems like it.

Minutes pass.

Tony’s sat ramrod straight, back aching in protest, but he doesn’t back down. The fluttering hasn’t stopped. The hope in his chest has long since been extinguished, leaving cold, dead ashes in its place.

He hasn’t blinked in a while, eyes wide, but unwilling to close in case he misses something important. Tony can hear his puffs of breath, can feel the strain on his chest to try and keep the rhythm steady, but he doesn’t blink. Can’t blink. He’s glued to the spot, heart racing, thoughts flitting from topic to topic and refusing to land on a single thing.

Peter’s eye lifts further from the usual twitch.

Tony stops breathing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this took so longggggggg and ooooooo cliffie lol
> 
> anyways leave me a comment, tell me how i did in hurting tony's feelings


	5. Day 1, part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It hasn’t been long enough. Peter’s body hasn’t been healing long enough. Those goddamn meds are the only things allowing his body some rest, and- without them, sure, the kid technically isn’t in a coma anymore, which is good, but it also means he’ll be entering a world of pain. So, is it worth it? Is Peter’s state of minimal awareness worth how much he’ll suffer for it? Not to mention they still have no clue what damage might have been caused by the oxygen deprivation; it could be nothing, it could be everything. Peter might not be Peter when he wakes up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and now i add internal conflict and even _more_ whump to this disaster. watch me go
> 
> poor tony, lol

“Peter…?”

A quiet breath, nearly a sigh. Almost. Tony shakes his head. He’s not sure this is real. He looks again.

A slight pinching of facial expression. It sits badly with him.

“You’re alright.”

It feels feeble. Pathetic.

It’s all he’s got.

Tony squeezes his eyes shut; opens them again. The world is hazy. He has to blink a few times for the image to focus, to clear up again, and then-

They’re open. Barely more than a squint, but… they’re open.

Tony leans forward.

Peter’s eyes are hazy, his pupils blown. There’s no spark, no recognition. His eyes are dull, just shadowed under a fan of eyelashes. His gaze is piercing, unseeing, staring into nothing like it’s something.

And it’s terrifying. Tony swallows harshly.

The kid isn’t awake. Not really.

Tony watches them slip shut once more. He purses his lips.

That… that isn’t meant to happen.

They _opened._

It’s impossible.

But… it happened.

It _happened._

Tony blinks; looks around the room, works his jaw. Huffs a breath.

Well.

That was unexpected.

So the kid’s managed to go from _comatose_ to minimally conscious within an impossible timespan. Cool. That’s well beyond the obscene healing factors of just about every person he’s ever seen or read up on before. But what _isn’t_ cool is the whole _massive blood loss possible brain damage_ thing. They can’t gauge how bad any possible injuries are. The sedatives shouldn’t be wearing off like this. They hadn’t taken into account just how fast the kid’s metabolism was, and now look.

“You shouldn’t be awake yet.” And then, in a whisper, “Are you even _awake?”_

No response, aside from a minuscule twitch of a muscle next to the kid’s left eye. He knows he’s watching pretty unnervingly closely for a reaction, hardly even daring to breathe lest he drowns out any noise Parker makes, but it’s for nothing — he doesn’t respond. It’s like Tony isn’t even in the room at all.

“Peter, can you hear me?” Yet it still seems worth a try nonetheless. Peter doesn’t respond to Tony’s questions. His expression falters from peaceful to almost _confused,_ eyebrows twitched just slightly downward. Tony realises that while the sedatives may be wearing off, he’s still on a cocktail of other drugs that are bound to leave him confused. Tony sighs; maybe a little disappointed.

“Didn’t think so.”

Tony isn’t sure if he’s even more scared or just worried by Peter’s inability to even register that he’s being spoken to. Is that because of the drugs? Or has the oxygen deprivation actually destroyed the kid?

Tony clenches his first in the fabric of his jeans.

There’s another few minutes before Peter makes his next noise, and this time it’s a small, whining noise rather than a groan. It’s hoarse. Distressed, almost, except for the prominently warbling tone to it that’s just _rubbing_ it in Tony’s face that his charge isn’t awake, no, but still in a lot of pain.

He’ll be the first to admit that this? This is _terrifying._ His guilt has taken a backseat now, tucked away behind his horror and concern.

“FRIDAY,” He murmurs softly, so quiet he barely hears it himself, “This isn’t normal, is it?”

_‘No. It’s not.’_

“Get Helen.” The urgency starts to bleed into his voice audibly. His blood is running cold across his body, sending a deep chill into his bones. This- this is wrong. This shouldn’t be happening, not now, not _now,_ why can’t the kid catch a break…?

The worst part is that Peter- _Parker,_ he tells himself, _Parker_ doesn’t slip back under again.

Tony’s hands are going numb from the death-grip he has on his jeans by the time it’s been five minutes since the kid first woke up. He’s been counting, second by second with calculated precision. He’s actually waiting for Helen, but he’s glued to the chair. Hasn’t moved since that first flutter of eyelashes over too-pale cheeks.

It doesn’t escape his sight that, asides from the occasional tremouring spasm of a bony finger, Parker’s body doesn’t move at all.

The muscular damages…

It had been _so_ close. So close. He nearly lost the kid yesterday. Tony rests his head in his palms; trying to find a rhythm to his breathing again. All he can see in his mind’s eye is Peter. Peter’s wide, doe eyes. Peter’s constant energy. His desire to help.

His glassy eyes, confused and full of _pain,_ the light in them dimming, blood coming from his mouth.

The stillness after the coughing, the wheezing breaths and the slack facial expression.

The silence.

It’s very much a strike to his heart when one breath, a particularly loud one from the kid, shudders on the way back out. Tony forced himself to look at Parker.

He itches to smooth out the lines that have etched themselves onto his face. The urge is foreign and Tony nearly draws back, but he catches himself at the last second. The kid’s strained, inhales turning to wheezes again — it’s too soon, he hasn’t healed enough yet, oh god.

Tony can feel his frown cementing as Peter sniffles, and that worry is replaced with pure, unadulterated _panic_ when small tears starting to make their path down his face. It makes his airways tighten with an unfamiliar type of pain; a burning, protective desire to hug Peter rising up in his chest faster than he can process it. The kid’s eyes are still alarmingly vacant, and he’s forced to remember last night’s researching. _Vegetative state, unresponsiveness… cell damage and loss of short term memory, fleeting awareness… step up from a vegetative state, but still on the way back from a coma… possible personality changes from oxygen deprivation, unknown until patient can retain consciousness..._

“Helen’s on her way, kid. Hang on.” He hates how lost Peter looks, like he can’t make sense of anything around him. He probably can’t, given the amount of painkillers and sedatives being pumped into his bloodstream, but it doesn’t hurt any less to watch. He can’t do much more than hope that it’s just delerium talking, and that Peter is under the drugs and exhaustion somewhere. If he is, he’s stuck under pretty far. But he doesn’t really blame the kid for being so out of it, because it was only yesterday that he was brought in. Tony listens as Peter’s little mumbles slowly drag from sounds to slurred words, until he can understand.

“...m’sorry-” It’s hoarse. Garbled. Hardly even a word, merely a soft utter. It’s coming from a torn throat and newly-healing lungs.

The small whisper diminishes any hope of Peter’s true consciousness.

Peter might be alive, but… he isn’t out of the woods yet. Until he can wake up for more than a few seconds at a time, they have no way of telling just how bad it is. And that’s a terrifying, grounding thought. He can’t let himself think too far ahead. Not now. Peter, who just wants to help. Peter, who just tries his best. Peter, who might never be the same because of this.

Peter, who despite being in a half-comatose state, just _apologised_ to _him_.

It’s like the air is punched out of him. The first thing Peter does is apologise. His fingers itch to move; to reassure Peter in some way, but hesitation pulls him back each time until he musters up enough courage to gently rub at the kid’s hand, careful not to jostle the IV line. Tony kneads gently around a too-prominent knuckle, and tries not to notice the coolness of Peter’s skin. No wonder both he and May recoiled yesterday, when the contrast between the body heat he’s got and Peter’s lack thereof is so obvious. He’s torn between offering as much comfort as he can and being within his comfort zone.

“Shit, kid. You got nothing to apologise for. Not right now. That can wait, get some rest. I’ll get someone in to do the painkillers.”

He’s desperate to do something now; like at least make Parker more comfortable where he is. Tony can’t safely change the IV dosage of painkillers and sedatives. Helen isn’t here yet. Peter’s hurting. Bad.

“You’re gonna be fine, kiddo.” He rubs circles at the same time he taps his foot down on the floor, quickly and smoothly.

_Tap. Ta-ta-tap. Ta-ta-ta-tap. Ta-ta-tap. Ta-ta-tap.Ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-tap. Ta-ta-tap. Tap. Tap. Tap._

An intake of breath.

“No… M’y.”

It’s just as incoherent as the first time, but slightly more audible. The words take a few seconds to process, to which Tony then frowns deeply.

_What?_

_Too late anyway, kid. Sorry._

“Wait, what…? Peter, are you awake? Please tell me you’re awake. Kid?” _Please don’t be. Just go back to sleep. C’mon._

“Ngh…”

It must be the meds starting to wear off. On one hand, it’s good that Peter’s metabolism is picking up again, but on the other, recovering is about to get a lot harder for the kid. So now the drugs are fading, he’s coming back up to the surface. That should be good, right?

Wrong. It hasn’t been long enough. Peter’s body hasn’t been _healing_ long enough. Those goddamn meds are the only things allowing his body some rest, and- without them, sure, the kid technically isn’t in a coma anymore, which is good, but it also means he’ll be entering a world of pain. So, is it worth it? Is Peter’s state of minimal awareness worth how much he’ll suffer for it? Not to mention they still have _no clue_ what damage might have been caused by the oxygen deprivation; it could be nothing, it could be _everything._ Peter might not be _Peter_ when he wakes up.

“FRIDAY, contact Helen. I can’t wait for her to- I _can’t_ leave him in pain.”

 _‘Contacting.’_

They don’t have long left until May arrives. If she were to show up now, in the middle of this… 

Parker’s eyes slowly close and open again in a mockery of a blink, and Tony swallows harshly.

“C’mon, Helen, hurry up…”

Tony knows she deserves her free time, she really does, because no other doctor could snatch Peter back from the jaws of death like that, but the kid’s doing things his research said shouldn’t happen and he’s pretty goddamn nervous about it. He was nearly dead. The kid was bleeding to death in Tony’s arms — he can’t forget the muted gasps, the rattling coughs, the blood down his front and the thin streams of tears down his face — just _yesterday_ and now this is happening. It _shouldn’t_ be happening.

_It doesn’t make sense._

“You’re okay, kid. You’re alright.” The words feel weird in his mouth. Maybe it’s because he’s not used to being comforting. He’s more used to using snark to reassure people, but that won’t really work with this not-as-comatose-as-he-should-be kid.

He keeps quiet when the mumbles start again, but his heart feels like it’s bleeding in his chest, spreading poison through him.

“Don’… take…” It’s soft. Slurred, but he still (maybe?) understands what Peter is trying to say.

He’s almost incredulous, hearing it. Peter survives intensive surgery and fights a shit ton of sedatives… and one of the first things he asks is for Tony to not take the suit? Presuming that’s what he meant, but… He looks over to Peter again, at the big, round glassy eyes that aren’t even starting to clear up.

Peter is literally half conscious, and asking for such… for such a _material_ thing? Something so unimportant, compared to everything else.

Yeah, the anger is starting to come back _real_ quick. Tony’s about to speak again when Peter beats him to the punch.

“‘m s’rry…”

It fades away again. Tony takes a few deep, calming breaths, and thinks rationally about the situation. Peter’s woken up, however briefly. That’s good. That means the oxygen deprivation hasn’t caused any life threatening damage. But… Tony’s throat tightens slightly, stomach turning queasy. _Repetition of the same things. Confusion, disorientation._ Short term memory loss, at least. And that’s all he’s picked up so far from a few minutes of limited consciousness.

But… it isn’t Peter’s _awareness_ that has left Tony so nauseous. It’s what the kid said. He’s confused about it for a few minutes. Peter hadn’t been awake whenever Tony vented, telling the kid’s unconscious body about how _angry_ he was. So why is he aware enough to assume Tony would take it away? A small flare of dread starts to climb up into his throat, because Peter should have been — hell, he still should be — unconscious. For the kid to know Tony wants the suit back…

Nausea rises up in Tony’s chest. Peter’s been hearing his rants the whole time. That much is apparent.

Now that he thinks about it, this is — or he’s pretty sure it is — a minimally conscious state. Tony _did_ his research, it means that Peter is _there,_ but just… couldn’t wake up for more than a few seconds at a time. And they say coma patients-

“Can hear… oh, god.”

He’s been berating Peter’s mistake the whole time, and the whole time he could hear and understand the constant stream of disappointment Tony has been spewing. That makes him feel terrible, like something crawled into his chest and died. The kid was on death’s door and Tony had been telling him just how bad he fucked up; how he wanted the kid to _know_ how close he was to causing a catastrophe that could have ended the lives of the people Peter worked so hard to protect.

Peter loves being Spider-Man and is more confident in his alter-ego’s skin than he is in his own; Tony knows this first hand. The sheer difference between Peter when Tony was recruiting him — anxious, stuttering, nervous — and Spider-Man in Germany — strong, curious, confident and snarky — had been and still is staggering to observe. And Tony’s been tearing that to shreds out of his own anger, panic and fear for the kid’s life.

“Oh, Peter…”

“m’sorry.” Peter’s eyes have closed again as he mumbles, fingers sporadically twitching for something that isn’t there. A surge of guilt slams into him _hard_ , powerful enough to make him bow his head in shame as Peter continues to stutter out half formed apologies through the teary thickness Tony can hear in his throat.

Tony leans over and clutches Peter’s hand. His fingers are alarmingly cold against Tony’s own, even as he rubs them slowly in a mixed attempt to bring the kid warmth and comfort. Peter still looks distressed, expression pinched as he mumbles, but it’s less delirious now Tony is near him.

Kid’s not even awake and Tony’s ruining everything for him. His instincts are desperate, urging him to leave the room and find somewhere without all these uncontrollable variables and unaccountable feelings.

When Helen comes in, he’s still got Parker’s hand in his own, cold, and he’s still battling the shame that threatens to engulf him. Her eyebrows are furrowed. Tony can’t tell if it’s confusion, concern, or both. He’s willing to bet it’s both.

“How long…?” She walks over briskly and starts fiddling with the IV. She’s changing the IV bag, hooking up a new one with clinical precision. He looks down at his feet, still tap-tap-tapping against the shiny floor quickly. The lactic acid is starting to burn in his muscles. He doesn’t stop. Tony watches the clear liquid start to drip rhythmically from the bag, but can’t feel the knots of tension in his shoulders unwind.

“About five minutes of…” He gestures to the kid, “This. He’s been twitchy for about… two hours? I don’t- I don’t know.”

“Okay. That’s okay. I’ve increased the dosage of midazolam he’s on, but… this is all _very_ hit and miss. His metabolism’s faster than… any I’ve seen before. But it’s at odds with the hypovolemia. There is a chance this might not be enough, or might be too much- so I’m going to have FRIDAY keep a closer eye on his vitals for now. Alright?” The medical words mostly fly over his head, but the gist of it sinks in.

“Got it.” Helen looks at him. _Really_ looks at him.

She slinks out of the room with a murmured, “FRIDAY will keep me posted.”

It takes five minutes for Peter to go back under, eyes slipping shut and not opening again. Tony keeps a hold of Peter’s hand. It’s slightly warmer now that Tony has been rubbing it to reassure him, but still below Peter’s normal, healthy heat. Tony sighs, shattered. The kid woke up from a medically induced coma and went straight into a nearly-panic attack.

That had been crushing to watch. But Tony supposes he deserved to see it, because he is the person who crushed Peter’s confidence.

“I’m sorry, kid.”

The rosy flush on Peter’s cheeks from the exertion simply being awake is particularly difficult to look at. He can’t help but rest the back of his hand on Peter’s forehead, checking for any temperature that might affect him later. There is nothing to be found, so he awkwardly leans back into his chair.

Then he spots the tear tracks.

Usually he wouldn’t even consider doing anything that would leave him so emotionally vulnerable in a semi-public place, but the tear marks just look… wrong, especially on a kid as happy as Peter. He grabs a tissue from the bedside table and dabs away the tears on Peter’s slack face. The continuous lack of response, while expected, is disheartening.

He sighs.

“You’ve got nothing to be sorry for, kid. You’re you. You’re Spider-Man. You spend your free time helping any and every person you can find. You’re something. I don’t think that warrants an apology. But… I think you forgot that. I think you let the suit make you think you were better than you were. I can’t let you think that, because then you do stupid shit like this.” Tony huffs, perhaps a modicum too fondly, as he rubs at his face. He can’t feel it much. That’s the exhaustion.

Peter looks so small.

“I’m sorry you heard all that. You must feel pretty crap right about now. You’re a great kid and a greater superhero. You just made a mistake. Granted, a huge mistake, but a mistake nonetheless. We all make ‘em. Not just you. I mean- look who’s talking.” Tony shakes his head, laughing quietly. Pepper wouldn’t like the self-deprecation. It just _slips_ out.

It’s too damned quiet.

_C’mon, May, hurry up._

“Sorry for leaving you to hold the ferry together yourself. I had to push it back together, though. You did a good job, given the circumstances.” It’s true, actually — reviewing the memory now, just thinking of Peter keeping that whole ferry together (albeit at the massive personal sacrifice of nearly his _life)_ both impresses and scares him. If the kid’s that strong… what’s to stop him from doing things like that again, once he’s healed?

Tony swallows roughly at the thought. _If_ Peter has to do something like that again, he’s gonna be there to help out so it doesn’t have to get that bad. He’s keeping this stupid, _too good for this world_ kid alive. When he starts talking again, he’s not sure if it’s to comfort Peter or to dislodge the lump in his throat.

“The forces acting on the boat… I think I miscalculated how strong you are. Massively. The boat would weigh several tons on each side, travelling at relatively high speeds… Your muscles would have had to exert so much force just to balance that. No wonder you’re hurt so bad.” Tony thumbs at the fabric of his shirt thoughtfully. Rogers never would have been able to do that. Thor might have, but Thor is a _literal god,_ so somehow, he’s mentoring a kid whose strength lies somewhere between _legendary hero_ and _actual god from actual mythology._

What…

And Peter hasn’t even reached the peak of his potential yet. He’s, compared to other heroes, a stumbling baby who can catch buses and hold ferries together. He’s got all of a few months of experience in the field.

It makes him oddly warm to think of what the kid has the potential to become. Just a few years, some guidance here and there, and Peter could very easily become the best hero out there.

Despite himself, Tony feels a small smile inch onto his face.

It drops soon after.

They have to get through this first.

“May should be here soon, kid.” He says, tone devoid of any telling emotion. But it still feels relieving to tell this to a possibly hearing, but maybe not, Peter, and the empty medical ward keeping him safe. It’s the silence after a funeral, the kind that’s got too much in it to break.

Tony lets himself fall quiet again, contemplating. Peter woke up. Unexpected, but it happened. He was hurting. Also to be expected after those injuries. He’d heard what Tony had said. Now that one- that one’s his fault. He won’t let himself slip up again. Only positive reinforcement from now on, and he’ll learn to cope with his anger in a healthy, non-yelling way. God knows Peter doesn’t deserve Tony’s fears and anxieties on his shoulders.

His chest feels tight. Helen (or Pepper, or Rhodey, or Happy) will tell him it’s unreleased emotional strain. It is, Tony knows that, it’s just in his nature to deny it.

But he can’t. Not now. It’s too much to ignore.

“You’re gonna be alright, kiddo.” His phone buzzes in his pocket.

16:48

**May Parker:** Just pulled up. On my way.

Hoo, boy. This one is gonna be a challenge. She knows the kid’s the spider-themed vigilante that’s been crawling about Queens for the past half a year, and said spider is very unconscious once again. Tony bites his lip, only stopping when the iron tang of blood rushes across his tongue.

**May Parker:** Anything new?

**T.S:** His metabolism picked up. He’s burning through sedatives faster than yesterday.

**May Parker:** Meaning?

**T.S:** He opened his eyes.

Tony looks over at Peter. He wouldn’t have assumed the kid had ‘woken up’; not at all. May’s responses come through alarmingly quickly, but really, can he blame her?

**May Parker:** Wait what?

 **May Parker:** Running up now, hold on.

16:54

**T.S:** Yeah.

 **T.S:** Yeah. He’s back under now, courtesy of Helen, but he did open them. I don’t think he woke up.

Within a few minutes of him sending that message, he can hear rushed footsteps approaching the room. He braces himself for an explosive entrance, for the yelling he knows he deserves and the onslaught of emotions when this rightfully gets pinned on him, but…

The door opens slowly. May steps in calmly. And that puts him on edge faster than anything else. Tony meets her eyes, and there’s not as much anger there as he thought there would be.

“Hello.” She says, voice cracking into a whisper. Tony winces. She _sounds_ exhausted; it makes him even more tired to just hear her. In fact, when he plucks up the courage to meet her eyes again, there’s the same kind of pervading weariness that he feels deep in his bones. She didn’t sleep either, then.

“Hey.” With a _thump,_ her bag hits the cold linoleum floor. Tony watches, concerned, as she slumps in her chair and kneads at her temple. It’s a reaction Tony finds himself sympathising with.

Who knew kids were so much stress?

Probably people more qualified to be responsible for them than him.

Tony doesn’t get offended when her attention turns to Peter, though, because if this were a part of his family on the hospital bed, he definitely knows he’d be 100% focused on them instead of anyone else, too. So he keeps quiet, tries to make himself invisible so he’s not intruding or anything.

The grief on her face tells the story of a kind of pain that predates all others. She grabs Peter’s hand lightly, almost as if scared of disturbing the kid’s slumber, and squeezes it even more delicately.

“I’ve booked the next two weeks off as paid vacation. They’ve given me the go-ahead, I’ve got holiday stacked up. If there’s any time I should be using time off… I still have to fix a few things up at the apartment. Can’t stay tonight. But tomorrow...” She murmurs. Tony looks up, stares at the face lined with heartache and the same saudade he felt earlier, and only feels gut-wrenching sympathy in his chest.

“If there’s any problems with that, I’ll see to it that I help out however I can.” Tony knows that New York is a busy, bustling place that constantly needs workers, and even though May might be using her well-deserved holiday, if there’s one thing he’s noticed about the Parkers, it’s that they’re not the most financially affluent of the bunch. Tony isn’t gonna let them sink into a worse state because May needs time off. So what if he covers a few bills for them?

May looks up at the statement. The expression on her face is thoughtful, and it quickly shifts to a slight smile. She doesn’t respond to it verbally, but Tony thinks that any reaction is better than no reaction.

Thoughtful turns to determined within a split second as May reaches down into her bag, producing a red sweater. Tony’s heart sinks. For a second, he fears it’s the top-half of the kid’s onesie and the yelling is about to begin, but she stays silent as she unfolds it and hangs it over the bed frame. Tony watches weary hands smooth down the crumpled clothing with a precise expertise. But to his surprise, it’s not the sweater from the kid’s makeshift onesie — no, it’s a plain, well-loved jumper that’s seen better days, much too large to fit snugly on Peter’s tiny frame. Guessing from the warm, grieving look on May’s face, there’s something important tied to the object. He won’t ask what — it’s not his place. A flash of white peeks out from the pocket. Headphones? May snags them, and her hands quickly settle into a rhythm of movements that untangle the mess.

“Oh, and- here. I brought these. I thought- I thought he’d like to have his music. I thought…”

“His phone- was in the suit.” May’s face gains a particular shadow that is telling that she hasn’t quite coped with the whole Spider-Man thing yet, so Tony adds: “I’ll grab it after I have the suit scanned.”

She still seems displeased. But she doesn’t ask about Spidey, so Tony decides to withhold that information until she says otherwise. The metaphorical ice really needs breaking, though, and not in the flirting way that he’s used to and would much prefer, because he’s about to freeze up with the tension in the room. Tony jabs a thumb towards the read sweater on the bed frame.

“That’s a little big for him, isn’t it…?” May blinks, and runs her hand along the fabric. The look on her face is downright melancholic, so he’s just gonna assume that there’s something to be sad about (well, aside from the comatose kid next to him).

“Oh- it’s- it’s not his. Well, it is, but it wasn’t his in the first place. It- it belonged to his uncle but- it’s Peter’s now.”

“Uncle- what happened?”

Her expression pinches. Tony curses inwardly. Right, okay. The uncle is a touchy subject. Noted.

“Ignore me, I’m being insensitive, aren’t I? Hah- sorry.”

He doesn’t look up when May speaks, voice curious. “Peter didn’t tell you…? No, he wouldn’t, would he- he keeps so much secret, I didn’t even know about-”

Ah. And here’s the part he knew they’d have to come to, but was really hoping to avoid.

“But _you_ knew.” Her tone is hurt. Tony looks up; meets her pained, softly wounded eyes, and feels his heart clench. He doesn’t have any cocky or familiar way to respond, any way to smooth down the emotional creases and calm people like he’s so used to having to do, no, he’s been rendered wordless by this woman, this so strong, so _caring_ woman, whose life is falling to pieces around her.

“Yes.” May recoils, almost as if Tony had physically attacked her with the words.

 _“Why…?”_ The thickness of her voice is one he recognises all too well. On the verge of tears, but trying hard to repress that urge.

“He never told me. I found out.”

“Why Peter, though…? There’s- there’s so many other heroes- _people,_ there’s so many other people you could have picked from. Why him? He’s- he’s just a kid, he’s _my_ baby, he’s- he-”

“It- I’m not going to say bringing him is was a mistake. It wasn’t. He did his job admirably. He helped detain _Captain-freakin’-America._ If that doesn’t show he’s capable…”

“Where were _you?”_ Tony feels an involuntary flinch rip through him. “When this happened, where were you? I thought- I thought you were his mentor, why was he _alone?!”_

“I don’t know. I’ve got- I have _no_ excuse for letting the kid deal with the ferry alone. I shoulda gotten a head on this Vulture guy before then. Should have listened to him. _Fuck,_ I am so, _so_ sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“You lied to me. You said he got hurt in an accident- you didn’t say he was holding together a _ferry_ with his _bare hands._ Why?”

“The kid- he wants to protect you. That’s the whole point of the mask. So nobody comes after you. I- he kept you in the dark because he _loves_ you. Not because he doesn’t trust you.”

The room falls silent. Tony takes a deep breath; closes his eyes. His thoughts are in turmoil, but he can’t find the willpower to control them again and clear his mind. _It’s the exhaustion,_ he tells himself, _that’s what’s making this so bad._

He knows it’s not, but who says he can’t lie to himself?

Tony sharply looks up at the sound of a quiet sniffle. He nearly slaps himself for not passing May the box of tissues earlier — when’d that get there…? — sooner, because really, for a genius, he’s being pretty stupid right now. Gratefully, the box is taken from his hands.

“I don’t want him to get hurt like this- ever again. I can’t let him.”

Tony lets a frown rise onto his face again. The kid’s unconscious again, yeah, so theoretically they should be safe to talk about this whole thing without being overheard, but… he’d thought that last time. Look where that wound up. He’s gotta fight in the kid’s corner here.

“He’s saved _lives._ God knows how many.”

“He’s a _kid.”_

“Yeah. He is. But he’s a _hero._ There’s not gonna be any taking that away — it’s part of who he _is,_ May. I agree, I- after this, I don’t want him to get hurt like this again, but- I got a feeling that trying to stop him’s just gonna backfire.”

“So what _can_ I do?! He’s going to get himself killed, and- and- I _can’t_ let him kill himself!”

“I won’t let him get himself killed. I _won’t._ I don’t care if I’ve gotta- if I’m gonna have to drag him out of fights or _whatever,_ I will _not_ let this happen again. I’ve fucked up enough with him. I’m not gonna let myself do it again.”

“You don’t understand! You haven’t- you haven’t raised him since he was a baby, you haven’t seen him grow up-! I can’t let him kill himself when he’s still got so much to live for and see! What if you’re busy, huh? What if you’re preoccupied again and he just _slips_ through your fingers again?! Because- it’s happened before! It just did!”

He knew that the majority of the blame would fall onto him, hell, he’d been welcoming it. Anything to help drive out the grief. Especially when he deserves it. But it still stings to hear it out loud.

“I can’t lose him.”

He’s got no response to that.

Actually…

Eyes averted, voice low and gravelly, Tony decides to speak.

“When he woke up- well, ‘woke’ up, the first thing he asked for was you. He asked me not to tell you.”

_“What?”_

“I don’t think he recognised me. But he wanted you _safe_ above all else. Even as he is, he wanted to keep you safe.”

“I-”

“He’s reckless. Sure. That’s a part of being a kid, and if anyone knows that, it’s me, but- he’s making a _difference.”_

She doesn’t speak. Tony continues.

“When I first met him, before Germany, he said that being able to do the things he can and choosing not to- if he chose not to, and it all went wrong after that, it would be on him for not doing anything when he had the chance. What he’s doing… he’s _stopping_ the bad things. People’s families are still alive because of him and what he can do… He’s taking the opportunity he’s got to save lives. I don’t know why, I’ll admit. I don’t know much about him. And that’s my failing. But this- this is _important_ to him.”

Once again, he receives no response asides from a downcast look and possibly the beginnings of more tears. He nudges the tissue box towards her.

“I think making him stop would hurt him more than it’d save him. Injuries can heal. It’s tough to see them,” Pepper flashes to mind here, glowing amber veins and tear tracks and a certain _heat_ clinging to the memory, “But they’ll heal with enough time. I don’t intend on letting the kid get himself killed any time soon. But- I think — and this is just from experience — I think this whole thing is a coping mechanism.”

He thinks back to Peter’s fierce determination for May to be kept in the dark. The almost fervid compulsion to keep fighting even after he’d been swatted down, the way he didn’t let the Vulture go like Tony asked. There’s something under the surface that’s been driving that behaviour. Like his obsession with taking out all of his weapons before they killed anyone else. But with Peter- Tony just doesn’t know what’s driving him.

Not knowing is what’s lead them to this situation.

“I don’t want him getting hurt.” He knows he’s just reiterating the same point over and over at this point, but some part of him _insists_ that May understands that he never wanted the kid to wind up like this.

“I can’t even _begin_ to understand how it’s gotta feel for you, because you’re his parent. I’m just the guy who’s doing a spectacularly shitty job keeping an eye on him, and I’ll- I’ll readily take the blame for that because it _is_ my fault for not being more attentive. Never been good with kids. But- I don’t want him getting hurt. That being said, I don’t think there’ll be any taking Spider-Man from him, either. He’s got these powers. There’s no removing them. They’re a part of him, even if it’s bad for him sometimes.”

“I… I’ve already promised to be a better mentor. I know it doesn’t feel like it’s good enough. Hell, _I_ don’t feel like it’s good enough. I want to help.” May looks up, and meets his gaze. There’s a kind of curiosity there that wasn’t there before.

“I don’t want to lose my baby.” She sounds lost, now. He gets the feeling, really — the hollow emptiness once the anger has burned out, the desire for answers…

“I’m gonna be there for him. Promise.” Tony huffs a mockery of a laugh, “Who needs to go to board meetings, anyway?”

“But- you can’t _always_ be there. Nobody can.”

“Then I’ll make his suit better. Add more features to let me know when he’s in trouble. Hell, I’ll link one of my suits to him if I’ve got to.” Tony pauses, thinks of the time one of his remotely-piloted suits saved the kid from a watery death. Yeah. He’ll do that. “I’m not going to him get this bad ever again.”

A pregnant pause follows the end of his little speech. Tony finds himself fiddling with his hands again, restless energy filling his body.

“Thank you.”

 _What?_ “I’m sorry?”

“I mean… I’m- I haven’t processed all,” She gestures vaguely, “-this, not yet, but… thank you. For doing everything you have.”

Tony twitches. Really, he’s not done _enough._ If he’d done enough, this would have been avoided completely.

“It’s not a problem.”

“Got under your skin, huh…?” Her smile is watery, but it’s still there.

He’s… out loud, acknowledging his attachment still sounds kinda odd.

_Don’t say yeah, don’t say yeah, don’t say yeah, don’t say yeah-_

“Yeah.” _C’mon._

“Could you- could you tell me? About Peter, I mean, about how he’s doing. I just- maybe it’ll help.”

“He’s… technically, when we say he’s comatose, it’s- it’s medically induced. It’s the blood loss and the potential for complications that made Helen decide to keep him under for a while longer. Without the meds, he’d be awake, and- he’s not had the time to recover. He needs to have the time to heal, and keeping him down… it’s the easiest way to do that.”

“So- you said he…?”

“Opened his eyes. Yeah.” Tony watches her eyes flicker across the room. “He heals quickly. Got a fast metabolism — most enhanced people do. He’s nowhere near healed enough to be allowed to wake up, but his metabolic rate picked up, so he was burning through the drugs faster than they were being put in.”

“What happened? When he woke up, I mean.” Her voice is soft, but melancholic.

“He opened his eyes- you know that. He, uh- tried speaking. Wanted to make sure you were still safe, and… apologised. Think he caught some of the panic-rant. He went back under pretty quick after that, but- he wasn’t making much sense. It’s to be expected, according to-” He taps his temple a few times “-all the goddamn medical journals I went through yesterday.”

She looks up, confused, when he mentions the journals, and he has a brief moment where he wonders if that’s the normal response to things before telling himself, _no,_ probably not, most people have _normal_ coping mechanisms. Tony watches her brush a stray lock of hair out of Peter’s face as she nods. He hopes that’s understanding.

“He’s still kinda cold. Is there any way to warm him up, or…?” She’s rubbing her thumbs lightly over the kid’s cheekbones, like she’s studying him for any response. She probably is.

“FRIDAY?”

_‘Increasing ambient temperature by…?’_

“Just a few degrees. Let’s warm this place up.”

It’s almost unnoticeable, but a small gust of warmth rushes into the room. He hopes the kid can feel it. He deserves to be as comfortable as any comatose person can be. His mind briefly jumps track to think of that blanket, the blood covered one from that family on the ferry, that he had dropped off in the common room. He’d had so much else on his mind that he’d forgotten to move it… if it had been clean he could have brought it back up here to keep Peter warm. He’ll get the thing cleaned tonight.

It takes a few minutes for the silence to be broken again, but Tony still feels off-kilter.

“How- do you know how…?” Her tone is at odd with her words, soft words contrasting against the distance on her face. The anger. The grief, the pain, all those _horrible_ emotions that really shouldn’t be pent up.

“He hasn’t told me.” Then, a pause, “Any accidents with spiders?”

“Oh, god. He- he was so _sick_ after that bite. I thought it was just the flu.”

“Bite?”

“It was a field trip to- Oscorp, was it? Yeah… how did I not notice?” Tony winces. Oscorp. Even before Afghanistan, Osborn’s sheer delight at weapon breakthroughs were… odd, bordering on obsessive. It makes sense that he’d move to biological warfare. But what would he have been doing with _spiders…?_

Tony doesn’t speak.

“I don’t know what to do. I spent all night thinking about that, about him, and…” She trails off.

Surprisingly, Tony understands the feeling. He’s got memories of being too pissed off to even consider what he could do about Peter, about the screw up with the ferry, but now, having not heard a (coherent) word from him in over a day…

His anger wasn’t worth it.

“I’ll let him tell me. Or I’ll tell him when he wakes up. I just…”

Before she can continue, a little alarm goes off on his watch. He wracks his head trying to figure out which self-care alarm it is, set by Pepper, before realising that yeah, it’s probably a reminder to eat. Slowly, and against his very leaden legs, Tony stands up.

“I need to go and- to do something. Are you okay here? Do you need anything?” He looks at Peter quickly, lets the regret fill his heart like water, and stretches slightly.

“I’m fine as is, Mr. Stark. You go take care of yourself, we’re fine here.” May’s focusing mostly on Peter now, gaze full of melancholia as she cradles his face in her hands, so Tony leaves quickly, feeling like he’s intruding on what should be a family moment. He needs to go, just to recenter himself. Just to take a small break. 

He's got a lot of things to think about in the meantime. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> but don't worry!! softer stuff soon (kinda)
> 
> Anyway, find me on Tumblr under spiderboyneedsahug, I'm gonna start [yelling] trying to post about how this fic is coming along and y'know, other stuff that I do along the way, etc!


	6. Day 1, part 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “He was… tiny. He’s always been just a little bit smaller than the rest of the kids his age. Had a hell of a grip though. He got hold of Ben’s hair and didn’t let go for about half an hour.” The memory flits through her head, of a much smaller, much younger Peter with his tiny chubby fists full of Ben’s hair. He’d laughed. It had warmed May’s heart. She can still see fragments of that tiny baby shining through Peter, even now. Her throat closes a little when she remembers just how much Ben had loved to make Peter laugh, how they’d go out and come back red-faced and overjoyed, like they’d run all the way home. They probably had.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now it starts to get more wholesome, now the hostility and stuff is out the way! This isn't it lads, there's more where this came from.
> 
> May and Tony are the ultimate co-parents and I would perish for them to mother-hen Peter.

One hand against a too-cold wall, Tony finds himself caught in a splitting yawn. The lights outside Peter's room are blinding. He’s… pretty exhausted, actually. Pepper won’t be pleased that he spent all night researching, but… she’ll understand. She always does. She’s way more than Tony could ever ask for. His watch bleeps again, the somewhat shrill noise echoing through the halls. Tony taps the surface of it, wincing all the while, because _ow,_ did he _really_ have to choose such a shrill alarm? He almost misses the quiet.

That’s a lie, he _really_ doesn't. 

Tony walks down the halls. There’s more people than there were this morning, much more (how long has he been in that room…?), and avoiding attention is a tiny bit harder than before, but he still makes it to the cafeteria with minimal disruption to his pace. There’s a few _‘hello’s_ and a few _‘I’m fine, thanks for asking, you?’s_ in between, but he finds that the noise is pleasant on ears more used to the quiet. Hell, he normally wouldn’t even think of eating in the public cafeteria, but the idle chattering and laughing of the ragtag family that’s formed from the compound’s workers soothes him more than he would have thought possible.

He should definitely grab something more nutritionally beneficial than a burger, especially because he hasn’t eaten very much recently, but that’s his number one go-to comfort food. He’s just happy that the cafeteria has burgers. It seems like something he would have put in place after a few all-nighters too many. But they’re good enough to have worked after Afghanistan, so they’ll work here, too.

And it does. He’s only a bite into it, but his stomach — hadn’t even noticed how much it had been growling, whoops… — immediately settles down. He could moan, he’s so happy. He didn’t even realise how much he missed the sensation of a full stomach until now. But hey, that’s his bad for forgetting to eat.

And he hasn’t forgotten to eat in… quite a while now, actually. He knows he’s closer to Peter than he is to most, but to be _this_ affected? It’s not something he’s familiar with. He’d gotten like this after Happy got hospitalised during the Mandarin debacle, and when Pepper was having her Extremis stabilised, and after Rhodey’s fall. But not really for anyone else. That’s probably weird. But since when has he ever been normal?

He finishes eating surprisingly quickly, with little appetite for more food. He’ll need to remember to eat later, but for now, he’s more than satisfied. For a brief while, he works on a few overdue Accords documents, negotiating more terms and making it more friendly to those parties who sign — contrary to what Rogers may believe, while he is okay with the UN panel and its 117 countries deciding what places the Avengers should and shouldn’t be able to go, some heroes might not _want_ to fight — and it’s _those_ people he’s fighting for. If Peter- if Spider-Man were to sign, Tony couldn’t let the UN send him overseas as some soldier, no, some heroes are better on home turf, doing their own thing. Free will is important, Rogers had a point there, but left unchecked… They’ve left enough graves to show how that one works out.

Another yawn comes to pass, leaving Tony’s eyes itching for sleep. He rests his phone down on the table. It’s starting to get late again, so he should probably turn in soon, especially to greet Pepper. But he can’t just ditch May and the kid without any warning. He rubs at his eyes and scratches at his neck absently before typing a quick message off to FRIDAY.

18:07

**T.S:** FRI, could you set me an alarm for when Pepper’s back reminding me to eat again?

 **T.S:** Don’t want her to kill me by taking away cuddle time.

 **FRIDAY:** Will do.

With that, Tony tucks his tray away into the trolley and forces himself to stand again. He’s a little wobbly from exhaustion by now (he’s getting old, oh god), but he slowly makes the trek back to the kid’s room again. The lights have dimmed since the day, courtesy of FRIDAY, to accommodate for the increasing sensitivity of the compound’s workers’ eyes in the night, and it’s relieving to not have _that_ unholy corona of light scorching his retinas.

He rhythmically drums his fingers against the smooth case of his phone as he approaches the room. _Pepper’s gonna be back soon,_ he tells himself, _not gonna be alone again tonight._ Maybe he’ll continue working on Accords documents again while he waits, who knows? He needs some kind of distraction, he _knows_ this, and anything will do at this point because he’s constantly falling into the same destructive pattern of wanting to care and wanting to protect Peter by pushing him away.

“Better?” Is what he’s greeted with when he pushes the door open, before he’s even stepped foot in the room. He pokes his head in.

“I’m sorry?”

“Do you feel better? You looked pretty pale when I came in earlier.”

“Oh- yeah. Needed to eat. Keep forgetting.” He slumps into the chair opposite May, Accords document on his phone as he absentmindedly taps at the screen.

“How do you forget to _eat?”_ She’s incredulous. He looks up. Most people get confused when he says things like that.

“Other, more important things to attend to…” _Like Peter._

“Oh. Oh, alright. Well- nothing’s changed while you were gone.”

“Are you alright, though?” He softly asks. May’s expression still contains all the markings of turmoil, clear as day, and she definitely has the right to feel this way.

“No. No, I’m not. I won’t be for a while. But… I understand why Peter kept this secret. It doesn’t mean I’m not- no, not _mad,_ I guess- I’m _hurt,_ but… I understand.”

“I think… I think it’ll be good for Peter to know he’s got someone in his corner. Gets kinda lonely when you’re always fighting your battles without anyone to lean on.” Tony doesn’t know how he would have survived the Avengers without Rhodey’s snark, without Pepper’s affection, without Happy’s sarcasm. They’re in his corner and he knows how relieving it is to know that. He just-

“You’re in Peter’s corner too, Tony. He’s got both of us. Two’s better than one.” Once again, Tony finds himself dumbfounded by the forgiveness he’s receiving. And the position he’s being offered in the kid’s life.

“It’s different with you, May, you’re- you’re his parent. It’s you he’ll trust the most. He needs you.”

“And I need Peter. But New York needs Spider-Man, too.” She says the words ‘Spider-Man’ like it’s a test for her, expression thoughtful. There’s always a difference between thinking and saying it out loud. It’s probably still a shock to hear.

Tony taps his phone, then puts it down and focuses wholly on what’s at hand.

“Given he’s in a…” Tony waves his hand vaguely, “Minimally conscious state, try to talk positively about his alter-ego, or just _not_ negatively.”

May blinks, and Tony finds himself swallowing reflexively. The room feels slightly too tight. He looks around nervously. He measures his breaths carefully. _In, four, hold, seven, out, eight._ Calm. Pepper’s gonna be back soon. He doesn’t have to keep this in for much longer. Maybe some human contact will do him some good. He’s got a feeling he’s gonna be wheedling cuddles tonight.

The talk is restrained for the next hour-ish. Not to a point where it’s uncomfortable, but just enough so that silence is the reigning sound more often than not. And that’s fine by Tony — he’s more than happy to know that this kid is still alive and is continuing to be so.

“I’m so proud of you, Peter.” Her voice is teary, and she holds Peter’s limp hand in her own. It’s cool, and it makes her soul ache to be so delicate with him.

How can he be Spider-Man when he’s so fragile now?

“And- we’re gonna have to talk about it, but- everything’s gonna be okay, baby.”

Tony wonders if the kid can hear her.

After that, there’s a lull in the conversation. There’s not much else to talk about. It’s not tense like before, but calm, and there’s less of a pervading aura of panic than before. Tony finds his muscles relaxing truly for the first time in a while, and- well, he’s… exhausted. For one.

May’s starting to drift off in her chair, and Tony nearly offers her a room again before remembering her words from earlier — she’s going home again tonight. He should probably keep her talking.

How?

Talking about Spider-Man would just be… insensitive. Ill-mannered, definitely. He can’t talk about the Uncle. Touchy topic. He couldn’t talk about trying to pardon the Rogue Avengers — it’s not that he thinks May wouldn’t understand the political nonsense, because she seems the type to know a little about a lot, but it’s more so because of the gut-deep, rage-fuelled _fire_ that rises up in him when he speaks of them out loud. He’s doing it for the greater good of Earth, but if it were up to him… now he’s had time to reflect on how he’d been the team scapegoat, he’s not exactly going to be happy to see them again.

He’s so deep in thought that he doesn’t notice May looking at him until she finally speaks.

“After Peter’s parents…” She trails off, swallowing audibly. Tony finds himself looking up, attention suddenly very focused on her.

“After their _accident_ , and when we first got Peter, I… I didn’t know what to do.” May finishes, almost under her breath. She’s fiddling with her hands. Tony can’t help it. He’s curious. Her eyes are far away, but she still gestures softly when she speaks, like she’s reliving the memory. He doesn’t dare to speak or interrupt.

“Ben — his uncle — and I- we weren’t ready for a _kid_. Nobody ever is.” She pauses. Glances over to Peter, and his decidedly less-dead pallor.

Tony can’t help but agree, because he certainly was _not_ ready for the impact a poorly dressed super-kid would wind up having on him.

“We still had all these plans and ideas for our own lives before we even thought of settling down… But then we had Peter all of a sudden, and despite us both being completely inept at being stand in parents at first, it- it _worked.”_

She sounds a little more teary, now. Tony averts his eyes. He would hate the staring, so- it’s best he tries to avoid making her any more uncomfortable.

“And it was _scary,”_ A sniffle, “-because neither of us had planned on getting so close so _soon,_ especially after he lost his parents… but it happened anyways. And it felt natural. And it was out of our control, and it felt too sudden and way too overwhelming. But we love him. We put our discomfort to the side because Peter means so much to us.”

At some point in her speech — Tony will never admit how many thoughts it had provoked in him — May has turned to look at him, something meaningful in her eyes alongside the wobbling tears.

Well. It’s nice to know he’s not the only person who’s been made to care by this kid.

But still. Peter… lost his parents too. That’s another similarity.

_God,_ he wants to protect this kid.

“I never knew he lost his parents.”

“Oh, you- that’s not what I wanted you to pick up from that. What I wanted you to understand is that we were pretty baffled when Peter made our world turn upside down to accommodate him. So I understand how you must feel right now.”

Tony blinks.

_“What?”_

She offers a wry smile for his troubles, adjusts her seating, and continues, “I could see it on your face. It’s the same look I saw on Ben’s face, and what I saw on mine. I understand, it’s- it’s _crazy,_ just having this person _pop up_ and suddenly you’d do anything for them, just… don’t hurt him by pulling away from him, you hear me? He looks up to you, y’know? If I hear from him that you’ve gone all distant, you won’t be able to stop me from-”

Tony’s hands raise up in a placating gesture, and he hopes May knows that he definitely, _definitely_ does _not_ plan on withdrawing his support. Not now. Not ever.

“Okay, okay! I’d never…”

“Good. Just wanted to make sure.”

Tony’s eyes are still slightly widened. May Parker bears an alarming resemblance to a pissed Pepper Potts. He’s… gonna try and stay off her bad side. Without a doubt, this woman could verbally rip him apart with the same ferocity.

“You’re the guy in the big bad world of heroes and villains, y’know?” Tony looks up. “If he’s gonna keep being Spider-Man… I can’t help him if something goes wrong there, I’m just… a normal person. But you’re not. You’re the Iron Man,for God’s sake. You stick up for him if another one of these big bads come up, and- and I’ll stick up for him in the boring, normal people world. Sound good?”

He doesn’t know why May is asking him if her plan sounds good. Peter’s _her_ kid. He’s just… some guy. He nods nonetheless. It’s not exactly like he wasn’t going to, anyway. This whole thing was caused by him not keeping a close enough eye on Peter, so he can fix that by actually putting things aside for him.

“I miss him.” It’s a small whisper, but it has the impact of a bullet in Tony’s chest. May nearly lost her nephew, and he’s thinking about himself.

“I’m sorry. Is there anything I can do to help?”

“No, not really. I just…”

The silence says everything she doesn’t. It speaks of a thousand unsaid words and thoughts that were cut off too soon, of all the things she knows she never got to say and it _bleeds_ her regret. When she looks at her nephew, at his lax, pale expression and the deep bags ringing his eyes, all she wants to do is hug him and hear his voice again. But she can’t. Peter can’t talk right now, not for a while, and looking at Stark- at Tony, it’s clear he’s at a loss for words too. The silence is murderous with its sharp blade, cutting through her thoughts. She needs to break the quiet before it breaks her.

“The first time we saw Peter, he was just a baby.” Stark looks up to her, expression pinched and definitely confused.

“He was… tiny. He’s always been just a little bit smaller than the rest of the kids his age. Had a hell of a grip though. He got hold of Ben’s hair and didn’t let go for about half an hour.” The memory flits through her head, of a much smaller, much younger Peter with his tiny chubby fists full of Ben’s hair. He’d laughed. It had warmed May’s heart. She can still see fragments of that tiny baby shining through Peter, even now. Her throat closes a little when she remembers just how much Ben had loved to make Peter laugh, how they’d go out and come back red-faced and overjoyed, like they’d run all the way home. They probably had.

“Ben loved Peter like he was his own son. Even before his parents… Peter loved him like a dad, too. But… then we lost Ben, too.”

God, that day… that day had been one of the worst of her life. Getting the call from Peter, his voice terrified and shaky and lined thickly by tears, hearing sirens through the phone… she’d been in shock at the sight of paramedics rushing about a body on the floor, and then she saw Peter in hysterics, babbling nonsensically, and then… 

“What happened…? If you don’t mind me asking.”  
  
There’s a pause. She takes in a breath, expression suddenly tense, and Tony has an unsettled feeling in his stomach that he knows what he’s about to hear. May blinks a few times, eyes misty, as she dregs the memories back up. She’s come to terms with her loss, and it still aches like a gaping wound, but she knows it can’t be changed.   
“No, it’s fine, I can… Peter and Ben were just going to the store to get some junk food for the weekend; they always used to, it was like one of our- one of our little family traditions, but… there- there was a robbery. While they were in the store. And the people- they were armed, and… Ben saved Peter.”   
“Oh, god. I’m _so_ sorry, Mrs. Parker.” She shakes her head and gives a teary laugh, gently dabbing up her tears with the small abundance of tissues next to her.   
“Call me May. And… Ben did it because he loves Peter. He was basically his dad. Peter hasn’t been the same since.” It slashed deep at her core when she first came to the slow realisation that Peter wouldn’t be the same. He never seemed to regain all his energy for things. Some days are as bad as those first few.   
“I didn’t know.”   
“He doesn’t like people to pity him. Peter keeps so much wound up in his chest… I used to think he was keeping something from me. Now I know, and… yeah.”

They both pause, and they’re synchronised in their movement to look at Peter. There’s something in the air, maybe that final jolt of understanding, and when silence nestles into the room again, it’s much less tense.

Some time, maybe half an hour, passes within an instant and before Tony knows it, May is sluggishly standing up and gathering her things up. He grabs the jumper on the bed frame and holds it up, but May presses it back into his hands with a smile. The fabric is very soft. He can understand why Peter would like it, asides from the sentimental value of it. May plants a kiss against Peter’s forehead, watching for any motion the action might bring, but there’s nothing. That’s okay, she’d mostly been expecting it.

“Goodnight, Peter. I larb you.”

The air is less heavy when they walk back through the compound towards where the car is waiting to take her back up to Queens. Tony stays mostly quiet at her side, seemingly deep in thought. May thanks him before climbing into the car, eyes beyond exhausted but smile grateful. It’s a relief that he’s able to help at least one person he’s affected by this.

As soon as the car is out of sight, Tony huffs a sigh. He’s got a hot date with Accords work until Pepper gets back from her trip, and plenty to contemplate while he’s at it. Like the tragedy that seems to plague the Parker family, or Peter’s very apparent guilt complex which seems to be the driving force behind his stubbornness. He’d wanted a reason why Peter acted like that, but he didn’t realise it would be something so traumatic.

He left his Stark Pad in Peter’s room.

Well, it wasn’t like he wasn’t going to go back there to say goodnight. He picks up his Stark Pad and rests the red sweater over one of Peter’s hands. Without the interference of all the machines, the kid looks like he’s just sleeping.

“G’night, kid. See you tomorrow.”

He doesn’t feel quite as weighted as he did yesterday when he leaves. He swings by Helen’s office briefly, telling her about the sweater on the bed, asking her to keep it with him.

“I’m gonna go meet Pepper now, Helen. Goodnight.” He says, a small yawn fighting him the whole time.

“Night, Tony. Try to get some sleep, please.” He makes a noise in agreement, and Helen sighs quietly before the door closes behind him.

19:04

**FRIDAY:** Ms. Potts is pulling up out front now.

 **FRIDAY:** May I suggest a romantic gesture?

 **T.S:** You may not.

He makes his way out front nonetheless, and tucks the Stark Pad away when he’s out front. The wind is pretty chilly, but he can already see Pepper walking towards the entrance, flanked by security guards. Some part of him relaxes when he sees her face, sees her completely safe. After the Mandarin… he always feels a little restless with Pepper too far out of his reach for a quick save if necessary. It’s the same with Happy and Rhodey, and he suspects, after this is over Peter will be joining the list of people he’s going to fret over a lot. He shoves his hands into his jacket’s pocket when the wind brushes past him coolly. It’s cloudy out, murky-skied. Pepper is drawing closer now, and she raises her hands to dismiss the guards before her expression breaks into a tired smile and she’s in front of him. She looks exhausted, but still draws him into a tight hug. Tony leans into the contact for as long as he can. He feels a little safer with Pep here, a little more content. She holds his face, stroking her thumb under his eye socket.

“You haven’t slept, have you?” Her voice, smooth like honey, finally register in his brain a few seconds later. He opens his eyes. Pepper’s looking closely at him, scanning his eyes for any telling signs of his exhaustion. She probably finds them all.

“I couldn’t, Pep. Sorry.”

“You don’t need to apologise, honey, you’re fine.” He’s brought into a hug. Tony reflexively rests his chin on Pepper’s shoulder and lets her be the big spoon. She’s taller than him anyway. He’s so tired. How hasn’t he been aware of just how bad it is? When Pepper draws away and nearly drags him down to the cafeteria for dinner, he’s still in a state of near-incoherent tiredness. If he knew this was going to happen, he probably wouldn’t have pulled all-nighters beforehand. It was really a bad choice. Much to his amusement, Pepper copies his early dinner choice and gets a burger, in comparison to Tony’s small salad. It’s pretty funny, actually. Pepper swats him playfully when he vocalises this.

“Eat your leaves, salad boy.” She mumbles before taking another bite from the burger. Tony snickers all the way, and follows her ‘advice’. They go quiet for a few minutes, content to just be in silence, before Pepper speaks again.

“You really care about this kid, huh…?” She’s much more quiet than before. Tony stabs at his salad a few times before eating the leaf.

“Yeah. Yeah. He’s just a kid.” He absently picks at his food, eating almost mechanically. The hunger is gone now, replaced by the knowledge that eating is _generally_ something a human has to do to not die.

“You _do_ know that this isn’t your fault, right? It’s horrible that this kid is hurt, Tony. I know it must be. But if you beat yourself up for this, what are you going to do when he wakes up? He’s going to need your help to recover.”

_He’ll need you._

That’s a hell of a motivator.

“You’re so wise, Pep. Are you sure you’re not some kind of god?” He sips at his water slowly, focusing on a small scratch on the table. Pepper laughs quietly. It lifts his spirits a tiny bit.

“Yes, Tony, I’m sure.”

“I’m not buying it.” He mumbles. Pepper snorts.

They finish up reasonably quickly after that. Tony takes up both trays of food and is rewarded by Pepper holding his hand the entire walk back to their room. It’s nice to have someone to ground him. He’s much more used to having to ground others and keeping his panic under wraps. Listening to Pepper talk about her journey, about how much she would have loved for him to have been there with her to enjoy the climate and also do the work they were dragged there to do, how nice the people were… it helps keep him from entering the negative cycles he’s been trapped in these past few days.

It’s only about eight o’clock by now, but he’s so exhausted he’d think it were at least midnight. Pepper seems to catch on, because she seems persistent in making him turn in early. He doesn’t fight back, and instead allows himself to be manoeuvred into the bathroom to make himself look, and he quotes, ‘less like a homeless corpse’. The sentiment is nice. Tony’s done cleaning himself up and brushing his teeth pretty quickly, slipping under the comforter seconds after. It’s… really comfortable, actually. He feels almost weightless, and the aches that had been spreading throughout his body from spending too long awake slowly begin to abate. When Pepper slips in next to him, he allows himself to be hugged tightly. It feels good to feel real; to know he’s in reality because of the warmth of Pepper behind him. She’s still mumbling about her trip, asking if he’s okay, and he tries to respond but eventually, he drifts off.

And he stays asleep for a solid four hours, well into the night. Small fragments of dreams start reaching him beyond that point, things that don’t quite make sense. It starts simple with little snippets of the Accords that have managed to remain in his head, random sentences from the document that need amending if they are to be safe for enhanced heroes or skilled operatives.

It takes a bit of a turn after that, fading to choppy memories. Scenes of a lake, vague panic thrumming through his veins, and eventually, as he knew was coming… the ferry.

It’s like his consciousness is haunted by the yells and cries he heard from Peter while the kid was single handedly holding a _ferry_ together — the forces pulling at his body nearly ripped him apart, should have ripped him apart, the kid nearly _died_ —, and he can’t help but feel guilty about that fact that he _heard_ Peter crying out in pain as two immense forces were literally _tearing him apart_ and only felt anger because the kid tried to help, albeit in an overly stupid and dangerous way. He felt anger because he hadn’t anticipated anything going this majorly wrong, because he hadn’t thought about anything like this happening, because he _cares_ about the kid and couldn’t bear to see him hurt.

Eventually, Tony gives up on trying to remain asleep. He knows what it feels like when anxiety rears its head, and he know which days are going to be the sleepless ones. Guessing from the pounding of his heart in his chest and how he can feel his pulse points throbbing in tandem across his body, tonight’s just gonna be another one of those nights. He’s getting too old for this shit.

He looks across his room aimlessly in an attempt to ground himself, and his eyes fall to the couch where the pristine package containing Peter’s suit rests. Tony bolts upright. The Vulture. He’s still out there, and they’re drawing ever closer to the moving day deadline that he’s bound to attack. He needs to get that suit down to the lab so he can pinpoint the fucker before anything goes even more wrong than it already has. On wobbly legs, Tony stands and hastily pulls clothes on — any clothes will do, as long as he’s decent, that’s all that matters, even if it’s a tattered Black Sabbath T-shirt and some worn jeans, it’ll do —, snagging the package and whirling on his feet so he faces the door. He hears a quiet hum, and sees a shift out of the corners of his eyes.

“T’ny…? Wha’s wrong?” Pepper’s voice is bleary, and _shit,_ yeah, she’s gotta be exhausted, jetlag and all that, he _really_ should have been more careful not to disturb her sleep. 

“Nothing’s wrong, honey, go back to sleep. I just gotta do something.”

“But- Tony, we-” A yawn, muffled behind a dainty hand, “We talked about this, you need to sleep to. Talk to me.”

“It’s just- the kid’s-”

“The kid…? Tony, he’s fine. Helen would have said otherwise. Come back to bed.”

“No, no, it’s not that, it’s the guy who put the kid in this situation- when we move all that tech from Stark Tower to here, it’s gonna be a huge target for him, and I really don’t think it’s a good idea to let him get his hands on that because he’s already shown what he can do with battered Chitauri tech, I don’t wanna find out what he can do with ours. Go back to bed, Pep, I promise I’ll take a nap later. Promise.”

It’s a display of her exhaustion that she doesn’t try to argue further, but instead snuggles back into the comforter and makes a displeased noise. Yeah, he feels that one, too. Tony mumbles a quiet ‘go back to sleep, honey’ before leaving the room. He feels bad for leaving, terrible, actually, but it’s a matter of real importance that they get this right. Tony isn’t going to let Peter’s information and his condition be for nothing by letting Vulture take his tech. He paces towards the lab, steps harsh and rhythmic, and feels every iota of his exhaustion weighing him down. His eyelids are already begging for him to just rest, but he _can’t._ The second he enters the lab, he itches for a drink. Just a small glass of scotch, he’d tell himself, but he’s more than familiar with the lies he spins to deceive himself. He’s still recovering from the whole _drinking-my-problems_ habit, and it wouldn’t be great for it to start up again here. When he denies himself the drink, it’s for two reasons: the first being for his health, and the second being because then he’d be just like Howard if he was drinking to cope and ignoring a kid. He’s not gonna let that fall on anyone. Besides, he’s got responsibilities to attend to now, and a bird-suited whackjob to take down before he gets his hands on _more_ dangerous tech.

Tony turns a magnifying glass onto the fibres of the suit. There’s no tearing or damage because of the reinforced fabrics and fibres lacing the material, but it still seems off putting to see that the suit is fine when the person wearing it is obviously not. They don’t match up.

And when it came to it, his suit wasn’t enough to protect Peter.

Tony shakes his head, ignoring the sudden burst of shame in his chest, and lets FRIDAY access the suit’s coding and the files in the Baby Monitor Protocol.

He can’t help the smirk at the function's name, though. If the kid knows about it — and he probably does —… Tony would have paid money to see his expression.

“Baby monitor… protocol- got it.” He taps at the hologram on the table, and almost instantly in response to his command, _dozens_ of files pop up on screen. They’re marked by date, but he can see all of the kid’s patrols before this, dimly glowing in the low light. Helping an old lady, stopping a bike theft, things as endearing and as innocent as the previous listings. Tony feels his heart warm as he watches there files play out. The snarky quips, the quiet laughter, the overjoyed chatter to every and anyone…

How the hell can the kid be so good in a world that’s so _bad?_

Tony feels a warm smile rising up onto his face, but he can’t help it.

It drops as soon as the more _recent_ files appear. Tony pointedly ignores the scenery of the blue, glittering water and the ferry on top of it. He just _hopes_ he doesn’t have to watch those, too, because he doesn’t know what he’ll do if he does. Instead, he taps on one of the darker images and expands it to fit the whole holotable. It’s before the ferry, but after the lake. So it should be the right file, because it isn’t in Queens. Actually, it’s around the time Peter would have been at his Decathlon championship thing. He listens in silence to the file.

 _‘Detecting three individuals.’_ He’s looking at a… van? At a gas station? This is awfully… not as big as he’d thought it would be. This is, compared to what he’s used to, so little, but it’s nearly taken Peter from him. And finally, he gets his first glance at the importance of Peter’s patrolling. An attempt to control the rampant crime and stop people from getting hurt.   
“Why is their secret lair in a gas station? That's so lame… Hey, suit lady, what are they doing?” Peter’s whisper tugs at his heart. Is it normal for him to miss the kid’s voice this much already? And… ‘suit lady’. The AI wasn’t called Karen yet. He wonders when that happened.   
_‘Do you want to hear what they're saying?’_  
“Wait, I can hear what they're saying? _Yeah.”_  
_‘Activating Enhanced Reconnaissance Mode.’_ The image clears up, and he’s looking at the van, and the vocal patterns, and a faint signal connecting them to someone else, likely the Vulture guy.

“FRIDAY, I need you to trace that signal. Find anyone else that’s connected to it.” He murmurs, eyes closely focused on the footage still. _  
_“…I got the gauntlet from the Lagos cleanup. The rest is my design…”   
“Whoa, that's so _cool.”_ Peter’s childlike awe at everything is incredibly endearing, even now. Even after everything.   
“…can't believe they're still cleaning up that Triskelion mess…”   
“…I love it. They keep making messes…”   
“-…we keep getting rich.”   
“…target inbound…”   
“They're in the middle of a heist- I could catch them red-handed! This is awesome. Okay, I'll, uh- I’ll get closer to see what's happening.” Red handed. Tony huffs a little laugh.

“Kid, you’re not telling on someone for stealing a cookie, this is an _arms deal.”_  
_‘Would you like me to engage Enhanced Combat Mode?’_  
“‘Enhanced combat mode’? _Yeah!”_ He sounds so… excited. He’s like an overexcited puppy getting to go for a walk, honestly. It’s adorable.   
_‘Activating instant kill.’_ He watches the kid’s arms flail around uselessly seemingly with no regards to the ‘stealthy’ mission he’s on, as if trying to dissuade the suit lady, and the protocol is deactivated.

It had only been there as a last resort, failsafe option if Peter ever wound up in a situation that would require it. He’ll put that behind many, many more protocols this time. Now he knows that Peter isn’t the type to kill under any circumstance, if he ever tried… he wouldn’t be in the right mind. Tony won’t let Peter live with that guilt. Maybe he can just add a new function that will reduce the dampening on Peter’s natural senses and their strength in combat.

  
“Wait- No, no, no! I don't want to kill anybody!” He sounds almost panicked, and Tony feels his affection towards the kid grow. He’s got these powers and the ability to stamp out crime, but he won’t kill. It’s so overwhelmingly innocent and true to his status as a child.   
‘ _Deactivating Instant Kill.’_

The footage cuts out abruptly, interrupted by FRIDAY’s voice.

_‘Signal has been successfully tracked to: Brooklyn. Nearest address is being forwarded to you now.’_

Tony hums and clicks open the coordinates FRIDAY had sent to his holotable. The image opens up and grows clearer, to reveal a pretty bland image of a warehouse. It doesn’t scream ‘illegal arms dealing’, and it’s tucked away into an innocuous location. No wonder it’s been running unchecked for as long as it has; Tony never would have known there was a problem if it hadn’t been for Peter.

“FRIDAY, I need you to tell Happy that the Vulture guy and his team have been planning to intercept the Moving Day plane and are probably in position to do so on the night. Tell him to keep up his guard. I don’t think they’ll attack the Tower, but it’s best to be safe. And I need to you tell Vision that we need him to guard the plane while we change the schedule of the flight to keep Vulture from it at any cost.” He finishes with a sigh, kneading at his temples. The beginnings of a migraine are picking up speed in his brain. The files from the Baby Monitor Protocol are still visible, each image hovering, but as much as he’d love to watch them… he’s exhausted. It’s still dark, and he promised to take a nap, so… Tony numbly walks over to and bunks down in the lab’s cot. It’s nowhere near as comfortable as his bed, but the world is spinning around him and he’s probably collapse on the way up to their room.

“FRIDAY tell Pepper I’ve turned in for the night. And I love her lots.” He slurs into the comforter. It reeks of motor oil, but that’s alright because he probably does too.

_‘Message saved. Goodnight, boss.’_

“G’night, baby girl.”

Tony rolls onto his side in an attempt to get more comfortable in the worn mattress, and slowly dozes off with one less thing on his mind.

He’s getting justice for Peter; there’s no two ways about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dad Tony and Mom May, unstoppable. Peter never stood a chance against their combined might, now he's on bedrest forever lol.
> 
> Find me on Tumblr @spiderboyneedsahug! Ask me stuff about this hell fic or whatever you wanna do!

**Author's Note:**

> I'm gonna try to do the next section quickly but these be thicc bihs and they take a helluva lot of work to do! So please forgive me for any medical inaccuracies, I am _not_ a doctor but a whumper, and I just like to beat up my faves a lot jhsjsk
> 
> But yeah, please leave a comment!! I need to feast upon reviews.


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